PRINCETON,   N.  J. 


BX  5098   .M62  1882     v. 2 
Mozley,  T.  1806-1893. 
Reminiscences  chiefly  of 
Oriel  College  and  the 

Shelf  


Digitized  by  the  Internet  Arcliive 
in  2015 


https://archive.org/details/reminiscenceschi02mozl 


ORIEL  COLLEGE 

AND 

THE  OXFORD  MOVEMENT. 

VOL.  II. 


REMINISCENCES 

CHIEFLY  OF 

ORIEL  COLLEGE  AND  THE  OXFORD 
MOVEMENT 


BY  THE 

REV.  T.'^MOZLEY,  M.  A. 

FORMERLY  FELLOW  OF  ORIEL 
SUCCESSIVELY  PERPETUAL  CURATE  OF  MORETON   PINCKNEV,  NORTHANTS ; 
RECTOR  OF  CHOLDERTON,  WILTS  ;  RECTOR  OF  PLYMTREB,  DEVON  J 
AND  RURAL  DEAN  OF  PLVMTREE  AND  OF  OTTERY 

IN  TWO  VOLUMES 
VOL.  II. 


BOSTON 

HOUGHTON,  MIFFLIN  AND  COMPANY 
New  York:  11  East  Seventeenth  Street 

1882 


The  Riverside  Press,  Cambridgt: 
Stereotyped  and  Printed  by  II.  0.  Iloughton  &  Co. 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  n. 


CHAPTER  LXIX. 

AIDS  AND  SUPPORTS. 

An  ambitious  generation  —  The  movement  to  nowhere  — Will- 
iam J.  Copeland — Isaac  Williams — John  F.  Christie  — 
Henry  Bowden  —  Oakley  and  Ward  —  Robert  J.  Wilson  — 
Woodgate  —  Bampton  Lectures  —  Lord  Blachford —  Samuel 
Wood —  Present  Dean  of  St.  Paul's —  George  D.  Ryder  — 
Medley  —  Thornton  —  Albany  Christie — James  Round  — 
Dodsworth  

CHAPTER  LXX. 

J.  B.  MORRIS,  EDWARD  CASWELL,  AND  DALGAIBN8. 

"  Nature  a  Parable  "  —  "  Pantheistic  Tendencies  "  —  Henry 
Caswell's  "  Mormons  "  —  The  "  Art  of  Pluck  "  —  The 
Borough  of  Old  Sarum  —  The  Abbesses  Ange'lique  and 
Marie  des  Anges  —  A  goodly  company  .... 

CHAPTER  LXXI. 

WILLIAM  FROUDE. 

Chemist  and  mechanist  —  Laughing  gas  —  Its  various  work- 
ings —  A  dangerous  cruise  thought  better  of  —  W.  Froude's 
work  for  the  Bristol  and  Exeter  Railway,  and  for  the 
Admiralty  

CHAPTER  LXXIL 

THOMAS  STEVENS. 


Naturalist,  agriculturalist,  Poor  Law  Commissioner,  Rector, 
and  Squire —  His  ancestor  Captain  Stevens  —  "  What  shall  I 


n  CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 

PA08 

do  ?  "  —  Founding  St.  Andrew's  College,  Bradfield  —  Over- 
'nrhelming  competition  19 


CHAPTEK  LXXIII. 

WILLIAM  SEWELL. 

A  read}' writer  —  Magnificent  —  The  Moral  Philosophy  Club 
—  Christianity  and  Mahoramedanism — Jacobson  —  Trying 
for  Winchester  —  Professor  of  Logic  —  The  Unsuccessful 
candidates  —  Founder  of  Kadley  College  —  Medisevalism    .  25 


CHAPTER  LXXIV. 

JAMES  ANTHONY  FROUDE. 

Inviting  a  controversy  —  His  attitude  at  Onel  College  —  Inde- 
pendent, imaginative,  and  poetic  —  His  father  the  Archdeacon 
—  His  seeing  little  of  his  brother  Iliurell — Fellow  of  Exe- 
ter —  His  bold  line  there  —  A  reaction  towards  Newman  — 
Wanting  work  —  Newman  finding  it  for  him  —  The  selection 
he  made  —  Why  ?  — What  followed    '  30 


CHAPTER  LXXV. 

THE  SACRIFICE  AND  THE  WORK. 

Giving  up  the  Classics  for  the  Fathers  —  Predominance  of  ma- 
terial work  in  the  outer  world  —  No  Biblical  criticism  — 
Poole's  "  Synopsis  "  —  Hartwell  Horne  —  The  Revised  Ver- 
sion  38 


CHAPTER  LXXVI. 

MARIA  GIBERNE. 

Prima  donna  —  Her  portraits  in  chalk  —  Her  enthusiasm  — 
Her  residence  at  Rome,  and  occupation  at  the  Palazzo  Bor- 
ghese  —  Cardinal  Antonelli  —  Pio  Nono —  Her  Roman  page 
—  His  sermon  at  the  Ara  Coeli  —  Mr.  Laprimaudaye  and 
other  students  from  the  Collegio  Pio  —  Driven  from  Autun 
by  Garibaldi  44 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  H. 


CHAPTER  LXXVII. 

ARNOLD. 

PAGE 

Origin  of  the  Oxford  movement  1  —  Indecision  allowable  till 
thirty;  not  after  —  Newman  and  Arnold  never  seeing  much 
of  one  another  —  Arnold's  oracular  sayings  —  His  sermons 

—  His  "  Church  Reform  "  and  Church  and  State  theory  — 
His  disappointments  —  His  provocations  and  his  temper  — 
Mr.  Litchfield  —  "  The  Oxford  Malignants  "  —  Great  soften- 
ing at  the  last  50 

CHAPTER  LXXVni. 

JOSEPH  DORNFORD. 

His  mother  Simeon's  tea  maker  —  Mrs.  Archdeacon  Robinson 

—  Macaulay  his  fellow.pupil  —  Leaving  Trinity  College  for 
the  Rifle  Brigade  in  the  Peninsula  —  "  Marmion  "  —  Fatigues 

—  "  i"orlorn  hope  "  —  At  Wadham  College  and  at  Queen's  ; 
thence  elected  to  Oriel  —  Ascent  of  Mont  Blanc  —  Sad 
event  —  Dornford  succeeding  Keble  in  the  Tutorship  —  The 
common-room  man  also  a  peninsular  hero  —  The  Prince  of 
Orange  on  the  Duke's  staff — Oriel  wine  cellar  —  Military 
guests  in  the  common  room  —  Dornford's  defiant  air  pro- 
voking a  swarm  of  bees  —  Proctor  57 

CHAPTER  LXXIX. 

DORNFORD  STILL  T0TOR. 

"Corporal"  —  His  romance  —  An  annexation  leading  to  a 
dire  feud  with  the  Wilberforces  —  His  second  visit  to  Spain, 
and  story  of  the  Irish  captain  —  His  emancipation  of  the 
Bible  clerks  —  At  Moreton  Pinckney  —  Women  of  aU  de- 
grees fascinated  by  him  64 


CHAPTER  LXXX. 

DORNFORD,  RECTOR  OF  PLYMTREE. 

Developing  into  an  admirer  of  Newman  —  Unsuccessful  at- 
tempts to  improve  the  Church  service  —  A  very  sad  story  — 
"Undine" — Vestry  battles  —  His  admirers  in  the  village 
—  His  fast  driving  and  imperious  bearing  —  His  popularity 


viii 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II, 


—  Why  a  bachelor  so  long  ■?  —  His  passion  for  old  furniture 

—  His  Oratory  and  Reredos  —  His  comfortable  marriage 
and  the  affectionate  remembrance  of  him     .      .      .  . 


CHAPTER  LXXXI. 

SAMDEL  BICEAKDS  AT  ULCOMBE. 

His  prize  poem  and  essay  —  His  marriage  —  A  double  star  — 
Visited  by  Whately,  and  the  Newman  family  —  "  Nature  and 
Art "  —  Rickards  with  a  college  friend  working  out  the 
science  of  handwriting  —  An  Oxford  professor's  handwrit- 
ing ;  the  Duke  of  Wellington's ;  Mrs.  Fry's  —  Discovering  a 
brother   


CHAPTER  LXXXII. 

SAMUEL  RICKARDS  AT  STOWLANGTOFT. 

His  patron,  Henry  Wilson  —  His  pupil,  Lord  Maidstone — His 
parsonage,  church,  and  garden  —  A  Sunday  visitor  from 
Bury  St.  Edmunds  —  "  Lu  "  and  "  Minky  "  —  Parting  com- 
pany with  the  Oxford  people  —  A  trial  of  friendship  — 
Taking  the  glebe  in  hand — Strawberries  coming  and  going 
—  Experiments  —  The  village  lad  sent  to  the  Zoological  — 
A  chance  shot  with  a  terrible  effect  — "  Stowlangtoft 
Street  —  Lucy  Rickards  —  Her  life  of  pain  and  her  Church 
work  


CHAPTER  LXXXIII. 

GEORGE  ANTHONT  DENISON. 

His  "  Reminiscences  "  —  His  English  Essay  —  His  connection 
with  the  Rutland  family  —  Rhubarb  tart,  hot  or  cold  ?  — 
Decoration  —  "  CockfiKhting  "  —  The  Athena;um  —  Glad- 
stone criticising  the  Reform  Bill  on  Liberal  grounds  —  The 
"  Conscience  Clause  "  —  How  to  deal  with  a  crusty  old  land- 
owner —  Denison's  fastidiousness  and  its  trials  —  What  he 
ought  to  have  been  


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  U. 


is. 


CHAPTEE  LXXXIV. 

CHARLES  NEATE. 

1PA0I 

The  small  gentry  —  Neate  bred  a  hybrid,  half  English  and  half 
French  —  His  prize  essay  won  from  all  France  —  His  con- 
stant quarrel  with  success  —  How  he  extinguished  bis  pros-  " 
pects  at  the  Bar  —  In  Parliament  for  the  city  of  Oxford  — 
Private  Secretary  to  Sir  F.  Baring  —  Clerk  of  the  market  — 
A  question  of  foreshore  100 


CHAPTER  LXXXV. 

EDWARD  BLENCOWE. 

At  Charterhouse  —  Hlnstrating  my  copy  of  Horace  —  TJstica? 
—  Persuaded  to  try  for  Oriel  —  Elected,  but  not  at  home 
there  —  His  letters  from  the  Mumbles  —  Marrying  and  set- 
tling at  Teversal  —  His  early  death,  and  the  three  volumes 
of  sermons  published  by  his  widow  107 


CHAPTER  LXXXVI. 

CHARLES  PORTALIS  GOLIGHTLT. 

His  early  introduction  to  the  world,  on  the  Continent  and  at 
Eton  —  His  ancestors,  the  "  French  Prophets  "  —  My  obliga- 
tions to  him — A  useful  and  popular  undergraduate  —  His 
curacies  —  Settling  at  Oxford  on  a  wrong  understanding, 
but  with  remarkable  results  —  Unchanged  alone  amid  uni- 
versal change  —  The  second  volume  of  the  "Life  of  Wilber- 
force,"  and  Golightly's  letter  to  the  biographer     .     .  .110 


CHAPTER  LXXXVn. 

CHAHLE8  LANCELOT  LEE  BRENTON. 

His  royalist  ancestors  —  His  father  in  command  of  the  Spar- 
tan—  Hard  lines  at  college  —  An  early  riser — Taking  a 
large  parish,  falling  ill,  and  returning  to  Oriel  —  Painful  ex- 
hibition in  the  common  room  —  Taking  temporary  duty  at 
Stedhampton  —  Refusing  to  bury  a  drunkard  —  Leaving  the 
Church  of  England,  and  publishing  a  sermon  to  explain  his 
mode  of  action  and  his  reasons  for  the  step  —  Starting  a  sect 


X 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUIIE  II. 


FASI 

at  Bath — Publishing  pieces  of  poetry,  and  translating  the 
Septuagint  —  Was  this  the  discharge  of  an  old  burden  laid 
on  him  by  an  uncle  ■?  116 


CHAPTER  LXXXVin. 

ANTONY  BULLER. 

His  first  Start  at  college  — In  what  condition  found  by  the  Pro- 
vost —  The  scene  at  Collections  ever  after  —  His  learned 
sermons  on  "  Church  Authority  "  123 


CHAPTER  LXXXIX. 

■WILLIAM  HEBERDEN  KAESLAKB. 

At  Charterhouse  —  Sir  Roger  de  Coverley  —  His  Oriel  friends 

—  Position  in  Devonshire  —  The  Diocesan  Conference  and 
the  Dilapidations  Act  —  Proposed  inquiry  into  it  negatived 

—  Sir  Stafford  Northcote  —  "  Much  to  be  said  on  both  sides" 

—  Resolution  rescinded  —  Committee  —  Report  —  County 
testimonial  to  Karslake  —  Great  gathering  at  Meshaw  — 
Genial  addresses  —  "  The  sleep  of  a  laboring  man  "     .      .  125 


CHAPTER  XC. 

SIR  GILBERT  SCOTT. 

Rectory  of  Wappenham  given  to  a  son  of  "  Bible  Scott  "  — 
Dilapidation  case  ^  "  A  lad  from  a  builder's  ofiice  "  —  His 
Taluation  justified  by  the  result  —  Another  dilapidation  case  132 


CHAPTER  XCI. 

EDWARD  W.  L.  POPHAM. 

Heir  of  Littlecote  —  His  favorite  subjects  —  His  rooms  —  Col- 
lege alarm  —  Scene  in  a  lecture  room  —  Last  appearance 
in  public  —  Long  abeyance  of  a  county  position  .      .      .  135 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 


CHAPTER  XCII. 

SIR  JOHN  D.  HARDING. 

FAQS 

At  Charterhouse  —  Constitutional  ailments  —  Inequality  and 
want  of  self-command  —  Queen's  Advocate-General  —  Amer- 
ican Civil  War  —  How  treated  by  Her  Majesty's  Ministers 
—  Escape  of  the  Alabama —  Specimen  of  British  administra- 
tion —  Sad  consequences  —  What  there  is  to  be  said  in  ex- 
tenuation  138 


CHAPTER  XCm. 

EXAGGERATIONS. 

Chiefs  outvied  by  their  followers  —  Mode  of  reading  in  church 

—  Prayers  to  east,  west,  north,  or  south  ?  — Apostolic  suc- 
cession and  the  Episcopate  —  Evangelicals  1  —  "  Peculiars  " 

—  Ecclesiastical  sanctum  sanctorum        .....  144 


CHAPTER  XCIV. 

puset's  sermon  on  "  sin  after  baptism." 

"Irreparable"  the  key-note  —  Fact  changed  into  dogma  — 
S.  and  R.  Wilberforce  coming  to  Newman  for  an  explana- 
tion—  Their  request  loyally  complied  with  —  Aftei-piece  in 
my  room  —  S.  Wilberforce  quickly  wiping  his  hands  of  the 
Oxford  party  148 


CHAPTER  XCV. 

ST.  Luke's,  Chelsea. 

Debased  Gothic  and  Italian  of  the  Georgian  era  —  Fonthill 
Abbey  and  Eaton  Hall  —  St.  Pancras  the  last  mortuary 
church  —  Barry's  vaulted  roof  at  St.  Luke's  —  Object  of 
speculation  and  suspicion  —  Heurtley  and  Sankey  —  An 
evening  service  and  a  missionary  sermon  —  Uneasiness  fol- 
lowed by  an  awkward  mistake  and  consequent  panic  —  The 
curate's  performances  and  apology  to  Dr.  Gerald  Wellesley 
—  Barry's  labors,  difficulties,  disappointments,  and  reward 
at  ilie  Houses  of  Parliament  151 


xii 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  H. 


CHAPTER  XCVI. 

■WILTON  CHURCH. 

PAGE 

Noblemen  and  gentlemen  commoners  at  Oiid  and  at  Christ 
Church  —  R.  Wilberforce's  proposition  —  Sidney  Herbert  — 
Thomas  H.  Wyatt  employed  by  him,  by  the  Bishop,  and 
myself  —  Sidney  Herbert's  first  idea  —  His  second  idea  a 
Romanesque  church  with  Alexandrine  mosaics,  etc.  —  These 
stuck  about  the  walls,  otherwise  cold  and  bare,  wherever  a 
place  could  be  found  for  them  157 

CHAPTER  XCVn. 

COMMENCEMENT  OF  CHOLDEETON  CHURCH. 

Old  church  small  and  mean  —  Ancient  open  roof  brought 
from  Ipswich,  with  colony  of  wood  carvers  —  New  church 
planned  to  fit  it  —  Incidents  of  the  work  — A  poacher  keep- 
ing the  neighborhood  at  bay  —  Operations  suspended  for 
years  —  My  own  labors  nioantime —  Singular  offer  of  assist- 
ance declined  —  The  Bishop's  undertakings  and  troubles — 
The  Chapter  House  162 

CHAPTER  XCVUL 

COMPLETION  OF  CHOLDERTON  CHURCH. 

Unexpected  means  —  The  Queen  Anne's  Bounty  Office  — My 
chief  contributors  to  the  church  —  Its  principal  features  — 
The  carvings  —  Free  Trade  —  Dr.  Cooke  Taylor's  tour 
through  the  manufacturing  districts  —  Andover  paupers 
sucking  the  horse  bones  from  Tid worth  dog- kennels — • 
Double  roof  to  the  church  —  How  a  chalk-pit  was  filled  — 
The  eighteen  fine  days  in  October  —  Open  roofs  —  Three 
testimonies  ;  the  Bishop's  coachman  —  Assheton  Smith's 
successors,  and  the  present  Bishop  of  Manchester  —  The 
Bishop  of  Salisbury  challenged  to  refund  Episcopal  income 

—  My  factotum  in  the  village  —  His  accident  the  only  one  — 
Interesting  episodes  of  the  work  171 

CHAPTER  XCIX. 

EAST  GRAFTON  CHURCH. 

By  Mr.  Ward,  Vicar  of  Great  Bedwyn —  Ferrey  his  architect 

—  Style  Norman  —  A  barrel  vault  intended,  and  in  prepara- 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 


xili 


tion — Was  there  abutment  or  loading  enough  for  safety  ? 
—  Mr.  Ward's  two  guarantees:  thick  ribs  and  low  flying 
buttresses,  the  latter  suggested  by  a  peculiarity  of  his  parish 
church,  itself  perhaps  suggested  by  the  "  roots  "  of  the 
tower  at  Salisbury — My  objections  —  The  circular  vault 
hazardous  —  Mr.  Ward's  previous  correspondence  with  the 
Incorporated  Society  —  Surveyor's  objections  —  Professor 
Willis  memorializing  ;  the  surveyor  overruled  and  displaced 
for  "scientific  gentlemen"  —  Correspondence  with  Robert 
Williams  —  To  no  effect  —  Seeing  a  hearse  pass  —  Sidney 
Herbert  and  Mr.  Montgomery  going  to  see  the  vault,  which 
came  down  on  the  centre  being  lowered,  killing  Mr.  Mont- 
gomery on  the  spot  —  Ferrey's  explanation  that  the  experi- 
ment had  not  had  a  fair  trial  true  —  W.  Froude's  opinion  of 
the  vault  182 


CHAPTER  C. 

MANUEL  JOHNSON. 

Coming  to  Oxford,  1835  — His  Catalogue  of  606  Stars  in 
the  Southern  Henn'sphere  and  gold  medal  —  In  charge  of 
Napoleon's  tomb  ;  receiving  French  visitors  and  presented 
with  cigars  —  Smoking  them  out  —  Appointed  Radcliffe 
Observer — Nature  of  his  work  —  Distant  results — Stellar 
parallax  —  Only  nine  or  twelve  stars  to  be  called  near  — 
The  rest  beyond  human  measurement  —  Ascertained  motion 
of  many  stars  —  Whither'!  —  Hound  what  centre"?  —  Self- 
recording  instruments  for  various  purposes  —  Terrestrial 
convulsion  —  Johnson's  various  qualities  and  attainments  — 
Hfs  difficulties  and  troubles  —  Example  of  Baily,  astronomer 
and  stockbroker — Johnson's  Sunday  receptions — His  col- 
lection of  early  Italian  engravings,  etc.        .       .       .  ,190 


CHAPTER  CI. 
James  shergold  boone. 


A  great  name  at  Charterhouse  —  His  prize  poems  and  essay 
at  Oxford  —  The  "Oxford  Spy"  —  Declining  to  read  for 
honors  —  Was  it  a  revolt  against  minute  criticism,  like 
mine?  —  His  pitiful  exhibition  at  St.  Mary's  —  The  Duke 
of  Newcastle's  offer  rejected  —  Lectures  on  the  mutual  rela- 
tions of  arts  and  sciences — "Council  of  Ten"  —  Taking 


Xiv  CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  H. 

PAOI 

orders  —  Making  mistakes  to  the  end  —  Editor  of  the 
"British  Critic"  200 

CHAPTER  CII. 

THE  "  BRITISH  CRITIC." 

A  private  pupil  —  Beginning;  to  write  for  the  "  British  Critic  " 

—  The  exclusively  theological  character  of  the  new  series  — 
Aggravated  when  iu  Newman's  hands  —  Length  and  same- 
ness of  the  articles —  Newman  too  much  occupied  to  write 
himself,  or  to  edit  eflBciently  —  Callers  at  Oriel    .       .       .  205 

CHAPTER  cm. 

LITTLEMOEE. 

Newman's  withdrawal  to  Littlemore  intelligible  on  ordinary 
grounds —  The  special  interest  of  the  spot  —  The  Mynchery 

—  St.  Mary  of  Littlemore  —  Church  and  halls  attached  to 
it,  and  made  by  Alfred  the  nucleus  of  the  University  —  The 
rude  character  of  the  existing  buildings  to  be  converted  into 
a  MovT)  —  Newman  writing  for  advice  —  His  simple  require- 
ments—  My  suggestions  not  adopted  —  The  Oxford  folks 
prying  about  the  place,  and  looking  in  210 

CHAPTER  CIV. 

THE  NEW  EDITOR  OF  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC." 

Newman  proposing  that  I  should  take  the  editorship  —  Rea- 
sons pro  and  con — A  mock  sun  —  What  did  it  mean?  — 
Three  mock  suns  and  a  parhelion  I  once  saw,  and  nobody 
else,  in  Rotten  Row  —  Other  phenomena  —  The  existing 
staff  of  the  "British  Critic"  carrying  themselves  on  — 
Some  of  the  writers  bowed  out  —  Articles  written,  and  not 
reviews  —  How  I  did  the  work  in  Salisbury  Plain — A 
meteor  —  A  "discussion  forum"  in  Bell  Yard  —  Mr. 
Roworth's  account  of  a  really  efficient  editor       .       .       .  216 

CHAPTER  CV. 

THE  WRITERS   IN  THE  "  BRITISH  CRITIC." 

My  troubles  —  My  own  articles  on   "  Churches  and  Open 
Roofs"  —  Pretty  little  wood-cuts  —  How  I  managed  to  get 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 


XV 


them  done  —  Two  architectural  sores  healed  by  time  —  Am- 
bustus  Phaeton  —  Oakley  and  Ward  —  Ward's  handwriting, 
dilatoriness,  and  obstinacy  —  Flying  to  Newman  —  Always 
too  sharp  for  me  —  A  question  of  two  brigands  —  Oakley's 
theological  essay  —  His  early  contemporaries  in  Baliol  com- 
mon room  —  "  Jack  Morris  "  —  John  F.  Christie's  article  on 
"  Ridley  "  —  My  marks  in  it  223 

CHAPTER  CVI. 

SIR  GEORGE  BOWTER. 

His  father  boring  for  coal  —  Bowyer  himself  brought  up  in 
Italy  —  A  friend  of  Charles  Albert  —  His  work  on  our 
"  Constitutional  Law  "  —  His  article  on  "Simony"  and  its 
serious  consequences — His  great  kindness  to  a  very  distant 
cousin  of  the  old  Radley  stock  —  The  Order  of  St.  John  — 
His  service  to  me  at  the  public  session  of  the  CEcumenical  .  231 

CHAPTER  CVII. 

MT  OWN  CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC." 

Not  quite  sure  about  them  all  —  Mr.  Osier's  "  Church  and 
King  "  —  Pugin's  "  Contrasts  "  —  The  study  of  evidences  — 
Temperance  societies  —  Armed  associations  for  the  protec- 
tion of  life  and  property  —  Church  architecture  —  Mr. 
Lister  Venables'  Letters  on  "  Domestic  Life  in  Russia  "  — 
—  "The  Bible  without  note  or  comment" — Ruridecanal 
chapters  or  clerical  meetings  — Religious  state  of  the  manu- 
facturing poor  —  New  churches  —  Dr.  Channing's  Works  — 
Advertisements  and  announcements  —  "  Open  Roofs  "  again  235 

CHAPTER  CVin. 

MY  OWN  CONTRIBUTIONS,  CONTINUED. 

Myself  editor  in  July,  1841  —  Oakley's  article  on  "Bishop 
Jewell  "  considered  a  new  departure  —  My  article  on  Sir  R. 
Peel's  "  Address  "  and  the  Letters  of  "  Catholicus  "  —  That, 
too,  on  the  Margaret  Professor's  "Lecture"  —  "Growler 
and  Fido  "  —  How  I  came  to  write  an  Apologue  —  The  ar- 
ticle on  "New  Poetry"  —  Kynaston  and  Lord  John  Man- 
ners —  Notice  of  a  prize  essay  by  Bercsford  Hope  —  The 


xvi 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 


robbery  of  an  alms-box  —  Sacred  Hymns  from  the  German 

—  "  Hymn  to  Eternity  "  —  Reserve  in  communicating  re- 
ligions knowledge  —  Open  Hoofs  —  Agricultural  laborers 
and  wages  —  "Clodhoppers,"  how  Keble  regarded  them, 
and  how  a  London  clergyman  —  Lord  John  Manners'  "  Plea 
for  National  Ilolydays  "  —  Dr.  Doane's  Sermons  —  The 
"Six  Doctora " — A  lawless  proceeding,  but  in  lawless 
times  243 

CHAPTER  CIX. 

THE  CHUECH  or  ENGLAND. 

The  Thirty-nine  Articles  —  Natural  religion  as  fulfilled  in 
Christ  —  The  Almighty  without  passions'?  —  Infinite  in- 
termediate agencies  1  —  The  Seventeenth  Article  —  The 
Church  Catechism  —  "What  dost  thou  chiefly  learn  ?  "  etc. 

—  Inspiration  of  Scripture  —  R.  Wilberforce — The  Atha- 
nasian  Creed — Eternal  punishment  —  No  use  arguing  with 
a  toothache  —  The  Creed  itself  —  The  Sonship  —  The  Bap- 
tismal Service  —  "  This  child  is  regenerate  "  —  Daily  morn- 
ing service  —  The  prayers  —  Miracles?  —  Thomas  Hill  and 

his  charm  for  warts  —  A  woman  cured  by  Holy  Communion  253 

CHAPTER  ex. 

THE  CHURCHES  OF  ENGLAND  AND  OF  HOME. 

What  were  the  leading  issues  between  them?  —  Truth?  — 
People  were  not  so  jiarticnlar  as  to  that —  Fear  of  the  super- 
natural ?  —  All  jieoj)Ip  had  their  notions  of  the  supernatural, 
though  they  did  not  like  to  regard  it  as  in  the  hands  of  man 

—  The  question  of  spiritual  loyalty  ?  —  Yes  —  A  convert  to 
Rome  was  a  traitor  and  a  renegade —  At  that  time  he  had 
no  future  —  How  was  I  dealing  with  these  vital  questions  ? 

—  Without  the  ])ower  or  the  will  —  Mr.  Brown,  who  could  n't 
find  the  soul  in  him —  Yet  he  must  have  had  a  soul  by  his 

own  showing —  So  must  I,  but  making  sad  work  of  it  .       .  265 

CHAPTER  CXI. 

HAVRE  AND  INGOOYILLE. 

A  new  world  —  The  ((iiay  —  Notre  Dame  —  The  cotton  ships 
with  saints  for  figure-heads  —  The  carts  of  the  country  — 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 


xvu 


The  burnt-out  shell  of  an  opera-house  —  Ino:ouville  —  Beauti- 
ful view  —  Our  apartments  and  our  attendants — The  coun- 
try and  the  peasantry  —  French  agriculture  —  The  food  re- 
sources of  Havre  —  How  to  drive  in  a  crowded  street  —  One 
of  the  first  "  Archimedean  screw  "  steamers        .       .       .  272 

CHA'PTER  CXII. 

CAEN. 

Like  Oxford —  Cheap  lodgings  with  historical  associations  — 
St.  Etienne  and  the  Conqueror  —  St.  Nicholas  —  A  trial  of 
faith  —  The  Hotel-Dieu  —  Peasant  proprietresses  "coming  ■ 
out" — The  Duke  and  Duchess  de  Nemours  come  to  the 
races  —  Ceremonies  at  St.  Etienne  —  Anniversary  mass  for 
the  Dul;e  of  Orleans — Mdlle.  Tyrrell  and  Miss  Tyrrell  — 
Le  Bon  Sauveur  ;  an  unlucky  disclosure  —  The  quarries  and 
the  Cereles  d'lTercule  —  A  feast  for  the  Olympians — A 
cheap  trip  to  Bayeux  —  The  cathedral  showing  much  ex- 
posure to  the  elements  —  The  people  said  to  be  like  the  Eng- 
glish  —  The  Tapestry  — An  honest  glazier —  The  Octroi     .  279 

CHAPTER  CXin. 

LANGRUNE. 

A  hidden  watering-place,  the  resort  of  clergy  and  Legitimists 

—  How  we  went  there  —  Chateau  le  Henry  —  Madame 
Marie  —  Achille  and  Hyacinthe  Valroger  —  Taking  charge 
of  us  —  Obliged  to  talk  Latin,  and  ratlier  big  iu  consequence 

—  Why  did  n't  we  go  to  Paris  ?  —  The  reason  I  gave  —  Call 
upon  an  Abbe,  a  rising  man  —  Caught  by  him  eating  his  mul- 
berries, and  explaining  my  conduct  in  Latin  —  Interesting 
souvenirs  given  us  by  the  Valrogers — Inscriptions  —  A 
favorite  singer  squaring  it  between  the  church  and  the 
world  —  The  treasures  of  the  deep  —  Bathing  at  Langrune 

—  Pilgrimages  to  La  Deliverande  287 

CHAPTER  CXIV. 

CHATEAU  d'oDTRELAISE. 

The  Count  and  Countess  de  Polignac  —  Desire  to  make  us 
good  Catholics  and  Legitirpisfs  -  luvitation  to  Outyelaise 


xviii 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 


accepted  by  my  wife  —  Simple  country  life — The  election 
of  the  village  mayer  going  against  them  —  Who  only  can 
talk  French  in  France  —  The  causes  of  the  fall  of  the  noblesse 
and  the  old  monarchy  —  The  Parisian  season  —  Once  more 
in  Salisbury  Plain,  "  as  we  were  "  297 

CHAPTER  CXV. 

"BRITISH  CRITIC,"  NO.  LXTIII. 

Meeting  a  miniature  flotilla  on  the  Orne — Special  industries 
—  At  the  "  British  Critic  "  again  —  Reviewing  "  Nature  a 
Parable  "  —  Formby's  "  Visit  to  the  East "  —  Notices  — 
Episcopal  Charges  —  Controversial  pamphlets — Reply  to 
inquiries  for  a  good  list  of  theological  works — The  Irish 
Church  —  Freemasonry  —  My  novissima  verba,  rather  sharp 
too,  bestowed  on  my  very  dear  master  and  friend  Edward 
Churton  303 

CHAPTER  CXVI. 

INQUIRY  AND  INDECISION. 

An  account  to  be  given  of  all  this  — It  could  not  be  like  New- 
man's account  —  In  what  region  of  my  mind  was  all  this  labor 
and  speculation  ?  —  Answer  not  satisfactory  —  However,  I 
had  my  reason  about  me,  and  I  knew  what  I  ought  to  be  and 
to  do  —  Variously  possessed  and  inhabited  —  With  a  leaning 
towards  the  Roman  Catholics,  accepting  arguments  in  their 
favor,  yet  coming  to  sudden  hitches  and  shrinking  from  the 
conclusion  —  Not  able  to  forget  the  question,  or  to  stamp  out 
doubts  —  The  question  daily  becoming  simply  between 
Roman  Catholicism  and  Infidelity  —  Myself  unable  to  in- 
stitute a  grand  inquiry,  to  array  authorities,  compare  proofs, 
and  abide  by  the  result  —  I  had  been  piriled  on,  or  pushed 
on,  by  others;  and  had  been  moulded  simply  by  communica- 
tion, or  by  collision  309 

CHAPTER  CXVII. 

FIRST  IMPRESSIONS  OF  ROMAN  CATHOLIC  WORSHIP. 

All  new  to  me  —  "This  was  truly  worship"  —  A  rude  an- 
tiquity —  The  congregation  reverential,  following  the  service 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 


xix 


generally  as  well  as  ours  do  —  Religion  showing  itself  in  the 
streets  —  Yet  much  that  must  offend  the  Anglican,  and  that 
he  finds  it  hard  to  understand  —  Indulgentia,  etc.  —  What 
can  it  all  be  about  ?  —  Holy  water  —  No  harm  in  that —  But 
is  there  not  only  one  Altar,  One  Sacrifice  1  —  Here  are 
many,  sometimes  even  with  no  congregation  —  It  looks  a 
mystery  and  nothing  more  —  The  Host  carried  out,  and  clos- 
eted for  future  use  —  If  there  are  any  number  of  worshippers, 
they  are  generally  before  an  image  of  Our  Lady  —  Is  not 
this  an  idol  ?  —  The  saints  generally  neglected,  or  much  ca- 
price shown  —  High  Mass  —  At  first  very  unintelligible  — 
Crucifixes  —  Calvaries  —  The  Host  carried  to  the  sick  — 
A  scene  in  the  Piazza  of  St.  Peter's  —  The  French  soldiers 
of  the  line  —  How  put  upon  at  Home  —  Failure  at  a  soldier's 
funeral  at  Caen  317 


CHAPTER  CXVm. 

TWO  SIDES  OF  THE  QUESTION. 

Was  the  universal  practice  of  many  centuries  utter  folly  ?  — 
"  The  weightier  matters  of  the  law  "  —  There  are  worse 
scandals  than  superstitions  —  Is  our  own  religion,  like  our 
policy,  one  to  win  all  peoples?  — "  Who  art  thou  that  judg- 
est  another  ?  "  —  Our  own  divisions,  such  as  those  on  baptis- 
mal regeneration  ?  —  "  His  ways  past  finding  out "       .       .  328 


CHAPTER  CXIX. 

THE  SACRAMENTAL  THEOBIES. 

The  "  High  "  and  "  Low  "  views  —  Transubstantiation  —  The 
laws  of  nature  and  of  grace  equally  Divine  commands  — 
The  Word  only  real — Little  communion  in  our  Church  — 
Is  it  only  that  Christians  will  not  make  an  entire  surrender 
of  themselves  1  —  Do  ladies  and  gentlemen,  in  many  churches 
the  only  communicants,  do  this  as  nobody  else  can  do  ?  — 
"High  views"  past  human  intelligence;  indeed,  all  views 
aiming  at  accurate  definition  —  My  own  belief  in  this  mat- 
ter—  Luther's  doctrine  so  "high"  that  Lutheranism  is  al- 
most extinct —  If  we  hold  any  sacramental  doctrine  at  all, 
the  world  tells  us  we  are  Romanizers  335 


XX 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 


CHAPTER  CXX. 

THE  TRINITY. 

PAOI 

How  the  form  of  the  doctrine  was  arrived  at  —  Myself  always 
desirous  of  the  very  words  as  far  as  possible.  —  Jesus  Christ 
the  "  Son  of  Man  "  and  the  "  Son  of  God  "  —  Strange  ques- 
tions haunting  Christians  through  life —  Personality —  Per- 
sona same  word  as  Praco  and  Preacher  —  Threeuess  not  in 
the  New  Testament,  or  any  sacred  number,  unless  it  be  for 
certain  lesser  purposes  —  The  opening  invocations  of  our 
Litany  —  Not  as  in  the  Latin  —  Not  as  in  the  French  — 
Causing  continual  difficulty  —  People  don't  seem  to  care 
what  they  believe  or  what  they  ask  others  to  believe,  so  that 
it  runs  easy  for  the  moment  343 

CHAPTER  CXXI. 

THE  SAINTS. 

Above  all,  the  Queen  of  Heaven  —  Were  it  not  for  the  worship 
paid  to  her  I  should  not  be  in  Normandy  ;  indeed,  not  in  this 
»       world  at  all  —  Where,  and  in  what  state,  is  the  Mother  of 
our  Lord  ?  —  Every  possible  answer  is  equally  presumptuous 

—  Do  not  the  saints  live  and  work,  as  being  in  Christ  ?  — 
Much  for,  nothing  against  it  —  What  is  the  cloud  of  wit- 
nesses ■?  —  A  "  masculine  "  Christianity  rejects  such  questions 

—  But  it  rejects  everything  349 

CHAPTER  CXXn. 

"  MARIOLATET." 

The  household  of  Nazareth  —  Jesus  truly  Mary's  son — Is  she 
less  now  than  she  then  was,  further  than  she  then  was,  re- 
pudiated, discarded,  laid  by,  remembered  only  as  one  of  the 
innumerable  crowd  to  be  gathered  before  the  Judgment 
Seat? — Impossible — Grant  that  in  her  case  there  is  no 
place  or  time,  then  love  is  paramount  in  the  question  —  Can 
Mary  hear  us  ? —  What  can  she  do  for  us?  —  Does  the  Al- 
mighty delegate  vast  powers  to  human  individuals?  —  That 
He  certainly  does,  for  it  is  the  most  prominent  feature  in 
human  affairs  —  The  new  Trinity  of  the  Gospel  narrative 
made  a  heavenly  vision  —  The  house  of  Nazareth  the  first 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II.  XXI 

PAOB 

Christian  school — Belief  the  child  of  will  —  We  all  admit 
this  by  supposing  a  moral  difference  with  those  who  differ 
from  us  —  Foregone  conclusions  are  universal,  but  they  have 
their  day   .  354 


CHAPTER  CXXIII. 

EOMISH  INVENTIONS. 

Testifying  to  beliefs,  not  creating  them  —  Fables  and  works  of 
fiction  generally  assume  and  illustrate  moral  and  spiritual 
truths  —  "  Paradise  Lost  "  and  "  Pilgrim's  Progress  "  said 
to  have  taken  the  jilace  of  the  Bible  in  our  popular  theology  * 

—  The  "  Assumption "  believed  for  centuries  before  the 
legend  —  The  interventions  and  appearances  founded  on  cor- 
responding beliefs  —  The  present  age  is  itself  re-writing  and 
re-moulding  history  to  square  it  with  its  own  notions     .       .  363 

CHAPTER  CXXIV. 

THE  FIELD  or  IMAGINATION. 

Natural  and  Providential  —  In  "high  places,"  between  earth 
and  heaven  —  A  void  that  must  and  will  be  filled  —  Want 
of  a  Hagiology  in  the  Church  of  England  —  Driven  to  bor- 
row from  dissenters  —  Ward's  "  Deathbed  Scenes  "  —  Robert 
Nelson  in  "Tracts  for  the  Times" — A  multitude  of  story 
■writers  presenting  themselves  —  The  Church  of  England 
does  not  gather  up  the  records  of  humble  Christian  life  — 
The  personages  invented  by  our  great  novelists  are  as  sub- 
stantial and  potent  as  if  they  were  believed  to  have  actually 
existed  —  Kingsley  gave  tales  instead  of  history  —  When 
Newman  began  to  publish  in  1843  the  "  Lives  of  the  Eng- 
lish Saints,"  he  had  no  choice  but  to  produce  them  entire 

—  No  practical  difference  between  legends  and  admitted 
tales,  if  the  images  take  the  same  hold  on  the  mind,  and  are 
equally  powerful  for  good  or  for  ill  369 


CHAPTER  CXXV. 

HOLT  WHIT. 


Traditional  interpretations  — The  appeal  to  private  judgment 
—  The  negative  tendency  of  thought  and  preaching  had  told 


xxii 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 


on  the  national  aocoptance  of  the  Bible  —  Newman  quoting 
texts  as  they  were,  the  glistening  surface  as  well  as  the 
metal  within,  made  his  hearers  feel  the  Bible  a  reality  and  a 
power  —  He  made  one  feel  that  the  Bible  contained  much 
more  than  the  popular  interpreters  had  been  allowing    .    .  377 

CHAPTER  CXXVI. 

THE  QUESTION  OP  THE  DAT. 

Eoman  ways  and  English  ways  —  Extravagances  and  defi- 
ciencies —  Order  and  license  —  Superstition  and  unbelief  — 
Impiety  signifying  nothing  ;  Popery  much    ....  382 

CHAPTER  CXXVII. 

DISCONTINUANCE  OF  THE    "  BRITISH  CRITIC." 

Differences  between  England  and  Rome  infinitesimal  in  com- 
parison with  what  they  hold  in  common,  but  socially  and 
politically  important  —  Censures  rained  down  on  us  —  The 
Bishop  of  Salisbury's  censure  reminded  me  of  a  passage  in 
the  "Clouds"  of  Aristophanes  —  The  four  Tutors  —  Tom 
Churton  —  Why  did  Newman  call  them  "the  four  gentle- 
men "  ?  —  Perhaps  because  Tutors  were  now  losing  their 
quasi-parental  character —  The  ground  shaking  under  us  — 
Newman's  own  retirement  to  Littlemore  —  To  be  or  not  to 
be  in  the  Church  of  England?  — I  was  advancing  —  Could 
I  stop? — Could  I  retreat?  —  Decided  to  go  forwards  — 
Wrote  to  Newman  —  Advised  to  wait  and  think  well  over 
it  —  Gave  up  the  "  British  Critic"  —  By  the  light  of  after 
years,  I  was  simply  seeking  rest,  nowhere  so  easy  as  in  the 
Church  of  Rome  386 

CHAPTER  CXXVIII. 

THE  PROPRIETOR  OF  THE  "  BRITISH  CRITIC." 

Mr.  Francis  Rivington  —  His  extreme  kindness  —  Dinner  at 
Hampstead  in  the  year  of  "  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin "  —  Re- 
minded of  it  by  one  of  Dickens'  ghastly  stories    .       .       .  395 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 


XXlll' 


CHAPTER  CXXIX. 

WHERE  LANDED. 

FAOX 

Not  in  my  nature  to  pursue  a  long  and  regular  inquiry  in  order 
to  a  decision  :  Jior  to  wait  for  "  calls  "  —  Newman  was  in  that 
mood  liimself  —  His  account  of  liis  conversion  to  Rome  in 
his  "Apologia"  compared  with  his  Paper,  1832,  on  "Objec- 
tive and  Subjective  Religion"  —  Felt  I  must  decide  soon,  if 
at  all  —  My  unfinished  church  —  Could  I  hold  the  living,  or 
minister,  while  conscious  of  considering  whether  I  was  right 
or  wrong  in  so  doing  ?  —  Was  I  competent  to  the  decision  1 
—  The  shortcomings  of  my  spiritual  nature  —  I  must  have 
a  "  call  "  to  Rome,  but  felt  sure  I  should  not  —  In  both 
Churches,  necessarily  and  admittedly,  a  large  amount  of  pri- 
vate beliefs  and  private  practices  —  The  argument  against 
Roman  beliefs  and  practices,  as  Conyers  Middleton  has 
treated  it,  equally  cogent  against  all  the  Christian  faith  — 
The  common  right  of  private  judgment        ....  399 


ADDENDA. 


Newman  family  acquaintances  403 

William  James  Copleston  —  The  cheerful  and  pleasant  spirit 

in  which  he  bore  a  serious  infliction       .....  409 
Dr.  Copleston's  Pralections  in  poetry  —  Reading  them  with 
Newman  —  Were  the  ancients  wanting  in  the  sense  of  the 

picturesque  1  410 

S.  T.  Coleridge's  expostulations  with  Dr.  Copleston  .  .  411 
Dr.  Darwin,  father  of  Charles  Darwin  412 


"Themes"  —  Who  read  them  at  Oriel  —  Newman  looking 
over  mine  —  Dr.  Copleston  sending  for  me,  and  asicing  a 
question  which  I  only  half  answered  —  The  "Spectator  "  — 
The  "  Country  Spectator  "  —  Thomas  Fanshawe  Middleton 
—  His  education  and  associates  at  Christ's  Hospital  —  Com- 
ing from  Cambridge  to  Gainsbro',  and,  with  my  father,  start- 
ing the  "  Country  Spectator  "  —  My  own  fondness  for  the 
book,  and  the  value  I  set  on  it  —  Not  fitting  in  well  to  Gains- 
bro'—  Charles  Lamb  running  in  our  family — Threads  of 
moral  and  mental  influence  —  My  own  early  recollections  — 
How  I  was  formed  for  my  life's  work  413 

Pergussou  on  "  Domes  "  —  The  true  form  of  St.  Peter's  —  The 


XXIV 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 


PACE 

chiircli  at  Moiista,  in  Malta,  classed  as  the  third  dome  in 
Europe  —  About  to  be  commenced  iu  1833,  when  Froude  was 
at  Malta  —  "Ideas  in  the  air"  —  Tbe  dome  of  Mousta  an 
improvement  on  all  tlie  older  domes,  both  in  construction 
and  effect  —  Built  over  the  existing  church,  and  without 

scaffolding  419 

The  Oxford  movement  again  —  At  what  cost  was  it  purcha'^ed  ? 

—  Tlieology  and  literature  —  Classics  have  had  full  scope 
and  opportunity ;  and  a  great  development  of  schools  and 
teaching  power  —  Nevertheless  they  do  not  hold  their  ground 

—  Banished  from  Parliament  —  Lord  Sherbrooke's  attempt 

to  supply  their  place  with  old  English  ballads      .       .       .  422 
Celestial  phenomena  —  The  great  eclipse  of  1820  —  Singular 
experience  and  its  lesson  —  The  momentary  feeling  of  a 
comet  coming  down  on  you Actually  in  the  tail  of  a 
comet,  and  noting  the  appearances  —  An  earthquake  at 

Grindehvald  424 

The  fate  of  the  Carthusian  monks  and  Sir  R.  Peel's  sympa- 
thetic notice  428 

The  cholera  at  Oxford  423 

Faith  and  Science  —  Buckland's  lectures  well  attended — What 
it  was  that  provoked  Keble,  Froude,  and  Newman  to  stroug 
expressions  —  Dr.  Prichard's  works  read  and  admired  — 
Bucklaud  talked  to  death  at  Stoiiehenge  by  an  old  woman 
he  had  challeni^ed  on  the  question  of  the  Deluge — Edward 
Deuisou,  Strickland,  Goodwin-Austen  —  Mills  of  Magdalene 
preaching  to  the  British  Association  on  Science  as  the  School 
of  Humility  —  Materialism  self-annihilated  —  Requiring  a 

God  to  rescue  it  from  itself  429 

The  cliarge  of  scepticism  —  Increasing  homage  and  unbounded 
offers  made  to  Cardinal  Newman  —  But  on  what  conditions? 

—  On  the  condition  that  it  is  nothing  he  has  been  making  all 
this  stir  about,  and  that  one  faith  is  really  as  good  as  another 

—  My  own  early  and  constant  sense  of  his  deep  earnestness 

—  He  might  indeed  early  in  life  have  found  iiimself  pursued 
by  unbelief,  and  might  have  therefore  resolved  never  to  look 
behind  —  Always  pressing  forward  —  Too  occupied  to  doubt ; 
or  to  linger  in  distractions  that  might  have  led  to  triaLs  of 
faith  —  Never  critical  —  His  activity  not,  like  John  Wesley's, 
destructive  and  dividing,  but  uniting  and  carrying  on.  His 
direction.  Pray  for  the  peace  of  Jerusalem  —  The  hand  of 
Providence  in  the  result  of  the  Oxford  movement  —  Shep- 
herds found  for  the  stray  sheep  —  Two  other  events  that 


CONTENTS  OF  VOLUME  II. 


XXV 


may  be  found,  the  one  the  remedy  of  the  other  —  The  exclu- 
sion of  a  religious  faith  from  the  education  of  tlie  Kii};lish 
working  ch\ss,  and  the  comparative  independence  achieved 
in  their  own  way  by  the  Irish  peasantry       ....  434 
Letter  from  Newman  to  the  author  in  May,  1832     .       .       .  445 


T  Ll  Jil  L?  >-»  O 

REMINISCENCES. 


CHAPTER  LXIX. 

AIDS  AND  SUPPORTS. 

There  can  seldom  have  occurred  in  the  history  of 
the  world  such  an  example  of  many  men  of  high 
qualities  and  considerable  promise,  bringing  their  re- 
spective powers  and  opportunities  to  a  religious  cause, 
not  clearly  defined,  and  offering  no  earthly  induce- 
ment whatever.  In  those  days  everybody  was  to  rise. 
Ambition,  whether  in  the  Church  or  in  any  secular 
service,  was  everywhere  urged.  The  good  books  of 
the  period,  whether  for  the  poor  or  for  the  better  off, 
had  their  differences ;  but  in  one  thing  they  all 
agreed.  You  were  to  rise  ;  you  were  to  be  a  great 
man  ;  your  virtues  were  to  be  discovered,  proclaimed, 
and  rewarded,  and  you  were  to  end  your  days  in  a 
blaze  of  triumph.  Every  boy  whose  quietness  and 
steadiness  marked  him  for  Holy  Orders  was  reminded 
by  many  examples  that  he  might  one  day  be  a  digni- 
tary, perhaps  even  a  bishop.  Church  patronage  was 
generally  administered  by  and  for  aspirants  ;  and  the 
(piantity  of  what  profane  people  called  jobbery  was, 
consequently,  enormous. 

With  all  my  real  love  and  reverence  for  Russell,  I 
cannot  recall  that  he  once  suggested  what  could  be 

VOL.  II.  1 


2 


REMINISCENCES. 


properly  called  a  religious  motive,  even  in  the  simple 
form  of  serving  God  and  furtliering  the  interests  of 
the  Church.  The  very  lowest  downfall  he  could 
threaten  idle  boys  with  was  that  they  would  live  to 
be  country  curates,  and  even  then  they  would  have 
to  keep  the  accounts  of  a  coal  fund.  It  is  only  fair 
to  say  that  Russell  devoted  all  the  latter  part  of  his 
life  to  parochial  duties  and  church  work.  When  I 
met  him  in  the  streets,  he  would  invariably  ask, 
"  What  are  you  doing  for  us  ?  "  meaning  for  the  So- 
cieties and  occasional  movements.  It  must  be  con- 
sidered, too,  that  if  he  had  ever  offered  the  boys  any 
motive  of  a  distinctly  Christian  character,  it  would 
probably  have  been  made  a  jest  of,  and  it  would  have 
caused  holy  names  to  be  taken  in  vain. 

This  proves  all  the  more  the  spirit  of  those  days. 
It  may  be  pleaded  in  excuse  for  this  intense  earthly 
greed  that  rising  was  then  exceedingly  difficult,  be- 
cause there  were  so  few  openings.  There  was  a  great 
explosive  force  below,  and  an  immense  and  compact 
weight  above  ;  so  the  ambition  of  the  middle  and 
lower  classes  could  only  heave,  surge,  rumble,  and  oc- 
casionally bellow.  The  instant  a  path  to  success  or 
an  avenue  to  pi'omotion  showed  itself,  it  was  crowded. 
Greek  scholarship,  antiquities,  and  Iambics,  every 
kind  of  criticism,  became  the  occupation  of  many 
hundreds  who  looked  to  see  what  they  could  get  by 
them.  Nobler  minds  revolted  from  the  vulgarity  of 
such  a  pursuit,  and  perhaps  excused  their  idleness  or 
their  dreaminess  on  that  score. 

When  the  ti'umpet  of  no  uncertain  sound,  as  it 
seemed,  was  now  heard  at  Oxford,  a  direction  was 
given  and  no  more.  All  were  to  retrace  their  steps 
to  an  age  of  which  they  knew  nothing,  except  that  it 


AIDS  AND  SUPPORTS. 


3 


was  in  every  respect  the  very  contrary  of  that  we  live 
in.  As  far  as  any  hope  of  comfort,  luxury,  or  splen- 
dor was  concerned,  it  was  a  march  to  the  North  Pole, 
the  Equator,  or  nowhere  at  all.  That  a  dozen  men 
with  golden  futures  should  abandon  them  for  such  an 
enterprise  would  be  something;  but  hundreds  did  so, 
and  if  I  name  a  few,  many  of  my  readers  could  easily 
and  immediately  double  or  quadruple  the  list. 

In  tliis  place  I  wish  only  to  enumerate  them  as  I 
should  the  candidates  for  an  office,  or  the  gifts  laid  on 
the  table  of  a  bride  ;  though  one  or  two  may  detain 
me,  to  be  dealt  with  once  for  all. 

Copeland  was  an  eminent  and  still  rising  man  in 
the  University  when  he  contributed  to  the  "  Tracts 
for  the  Times,"  and  the  "  Library  of  the  Fathers." 
Isaac  Williams  was  a  very  considerable  poet,  and  for 
his  share  in  the  movement  was  beaten  in  the  contest 
for  the  Professorship  of  Poetry  by  a  man  who  could 
not  write  a  line  of  poetry.  Robert  and  Henry  Wil- 
berforce  contributed,  not  the  least  part  of  their  sacri- 
fice, an  illustrious  name  upon  which  England  was 
just  then  desirous  to  heap  honors  and  rewards.  The 
former  brought  a  wide  range  of  reading  and  much 
literary  power  ;  the  latter  his  full  share  in  the  pre- 
cious heritage  of  a  bright  and  sympathetic  nature. 

John  F.  Christie,  born  to  be  a  poet  and  a  novelist, 
preached  sermons  and  wrote  articles  and  reviews  in 
the  cause,  and  died  comparatively  young  in  the  faith- 
ful and  diligent  discharge  of  parochial  duties.  Long 
after  his  death,  a  very  distinguished  man,  and  a  very 
good  judge  of  character,  observed  to  me  that  he  could 
not  conceive  Christie  doing  anything  that  he  knew  to 
be  wrong.  Indeed  he  inherited  from  his  Scotch  ex- 
traction a  certain  excess  of  scrupulosity,  presenting  a 
strong  contrast  to  the  poetical  side  of  his  character. 


4 


REMINISCENCES. 


Henry  Bowden  had  been  Newman's  earliest  friend 
at  Trinity.  Together  they  revived  at  Oxford  the  for- 
gotten memory  of  St.  Bartholomew's  Eve.  Bowden 
went  along  with  his  dear  friend  so  far  as  to  write,  in 
anytliing  but  a  Protestant  sense,  the  Life  of  Gregory 
the  Great,  but  no  further,  though  his  surviving  family 
could  not  rest  wliere  he  had  left  them. 

Prominent,  if  not  the  foremost  of  the  group  that 
contended  round  Newman,  but  fighting  battles  of 
their  own,  were  two  men,  Oakley  and  Ward,  as  dif- 
ferent as  can  well  be  imagined,  but  somehow  as  much 
associated  as  Castor  and  Pollux,  Damon  and  Pythias, 
or  any  two  inseparable  pairs.  The  points  in  common 
between  them  were  that  they  were  both  Baliol  men, 
great  names  in  the  University,  and  very  considerable 
personages  to  come  spontaneously,  from  a  distant  part 
of  the  sphere,  to  a  centre  of  attraction  which  did  not 
invite  everybody.  Both  of  them,  having  received 
their  new  impulses,  went  ahead,  disregarded  warn- 
ings, and  defied  control.  As  it  had  been  entirely 
their  own  choice  to  come,  so  they  consulted  their  own 
choice  in  going  on.  The  differences  between  them 
were  great. 

Oakley  was  a  rather  brilliant  essayist,  a  poet,  and 
a  musician.  He  was  very  impressible  and  impulsive. 
Years  before  the  movement,  a  clever  but  cynical  Oriel 
friend  described  him  as  so  impressed  by  worship  and 
devotion,  that  if  he  should  come  upon  a  temple  filled 
with  a  multitude  prostrate  before  an  idol,  he  would 
throw  himself  down  amongst  them.  Nobody  cared 
less  for  himself,  or  took  less  care  of  himself.  He 
spent  his  life  eventually  serving  a  poor  congregation, 
chiefly  Irish,  in  the  not  very  attractive  region  of 
Islington.    He  might  be  seen  limping   about  the 


AIDS  AND  SUPPORTS. 


5 


streets  of  London  —  for  he  was  very  lame  —  a  mis- 
shapen fabric  of  bare  bones,  upon  which  hung  some 
very  shabby  canonicals.  Yet  his  eye  was  bright,  and 
his  voice,  though  sorrowful,  was  kind,  and  he  was 
always  glad  to  greet  an  old  friend.  He  could  some- 
times be  induced  to  dine  quietly  at  Lambeth  and  talk 
over  old  daj's  with  the  Primate.  There  was  always 
something  aristocratic  even  in  the  wreck. 

Ward  was  the  very  opposite  in  most  personal 
respects.  He  represented  the  intellectual  force,  the 
irrefragable  logic,  the  absolute  self-confidence,  and 
the  headlong  impetuosity  of  the  Rugby  school. 
Whatever  he  said  or  did  was  right.  As  a  philoso- 
pher and  a  logician  it  was  hard  to  deal  with  him. 
He  had  been  instantaneously  converted  to  Newman 
by  a  single  line  in  an  introduction  to  one  of  his  works, 
to  the  effect  that  Protestantism  could  never  have 
corrupted  into  Popery.  Instantaneous  conversions  do 
not  pretend  to  be  amenable  to  the  laws  of  reason, 
but  it  can  hardly  be  thought  a  necessary  note  of  a 
true  Church,  that  it  shall  be  easily  and  rapidly  cor- 
ruptible into  something  veiy  different  from  its  first 
self.  The  conditions  of  the  first  three  centuries,  and 
of  the  nineteenth,  are  so  different  that  it  is  not  pos- 
sible to  make  a  comparison  between  the  Christians 
of  the  two  periods ;  and  any  one  who  seriously  sets 
about  such  a  comparison  will  encounter  a  few  sur- 
prises. Ward's  weight  in  tlie  University  was  great, 
and  that  weight  he  brought  to  Newman's  cause, 
though  eventually  he  became  a  very  unaccommodat- 
ing and  unmanageable  member  of  the  crew.  Ward, 
I  must  add,  was  a  great  musical  critic,  knew  all  the 
operas,  and  was  an  admirable  buffo  singer. 

Robert  J.  Wilson,  besides  some  literary  power. 


6 


REMINISCENCES. 


brouglit  a  large  stock  of  those  social  qualities  which 
in  this  country  are  the  readiest  means  of  advance- 
ment in  any  walk  of  private  or  public  life.  If  he 
gave  way  to  his  humor  till  it  became  his  leading 
quality,  that  measures  the  sacrifice  he  had  to  make 
when  he  addressed  himself  to  ecclesiastical  and  theo- 
logical questions,  and  the  hard  drudgery  of  transla- 
tion. 

Oldham  was  no  inconsiderable  figure  in  the  group; 
a  man  of  sure  sense,  invariable  good  nature,  and  solid 
abilities.  He  was  never  young,  and  promised  never 
to  be  old,  for  when  I  saw  him  at  the  age  of  seventy, 
he  looked  scarcely  older  than  he  did  at  nineteen.  If 
Wilson  could  find  so  much  to  amuse  him  in  Oldham's 
singular  staidness  of  character,  he  will  not  be  sur- 
prised to  find  himself  associated  with  his  friend. 

Woodgate,  of  St.  John's,  was  one  of  the  most  im- 
portant accessions  from  the  outer  circle.  He  was 
about  the  most  popular  man  at  Oxford,  or  wherever 
there  were  Oxford  men,  whether  in  Newman's  cause, 
or  when  that  cause  had  lost  its  chief.  His  popularity, 
however,  depended  latterly  rather  on  some  special 
unction  or  singular  grace,  beaming  and  warming 
through  his  face  and  his  manner,  than  on  the  par- 
ticular gifts  by  which  it  is  usually  acquired.  He 
could  not  speak  intelligibly,  or  hear  distinctly;  nor 
would  he  write  with  couimon  care.  Yet  the  very 
sight  of  his  caput  honestum,  as  he  strove  to  know 
what  was  going  on,  and  to  say  something  to  the  pur- 
pose, but  in  vain,  moved  all  hearts  to  love  and  accord. 
It  only  proves  how  little  reason  has  to  do  with  the 
affections,  even  in  the  greatest  of  causes. 

Woodgate  was  Bampton  lecturer  about  this  time. 
He  took  the  subject  everybody  was  then  talking  and 


AIDS  AND  SUPPORTS. 


7 


writing  about,  Scripture  and  Tradition,  and  the 
thesis  he  maintained  was  not  itself  difficult.  When 
there  were  no  Christian  Scriptures,  there  must  have 
been  oral  teaching,  and  till  that  teaching  was  com- 
mitted to  writing  by  the  teacher  it  must  have  re- 
mained oral  tradition.  The  same  circumstances  and 
Ihe  same  necessity  must  have  continued  in  greater  or 
less  degree,  and  must  still  continue.  Woodgate  was 
said  to  afford  a  prq,ctical  illustration  of  his  thesis. 
Like  some  other  Bampton  lecturers,  he  mounted  St. 
Mary's  pulpit  every  Sunday  with  his  lecture  only 
half  written,  and  after  ten  minutes,  in  default  of 
Scripture,  his  hearers  had  to  be  content  with  oral 
tradition.  Modest  as  the  scope  of  his  argument  was, 
he  knew  what  he  was  about,  which  Shuttleworth  did 
not.  Baden  Powell  entered  the  lists  with  "  Tradition 
Unveiled,"  in  a  way  which  unveiled  Scripture  also, 
and  proved,  at  all  events,  that  they  have  a  common 
cause. 

Rogers,  now  Lord  Blacliford,  a  distinguished  Eto- 
nian, member  of  an  old  Plymouth  family,  numbei'ing 
among  its  worthies  John  Rogers,  the  Marian  proto- 
martyr,  and  another  John  Rogers,  a  not  less  consistent 
and  obstinate  Fifth  Monarchy  man,  brought  to  New- 
man's cause  a  lawyer's  career  and  prospects  of  office, 
guaranteed  by  sound  scholarship,  practical  judgment, 
and  very  great  industry. 

Samuel  Wood,  brother  of  Charles,  now  Earl  of 
Halifax,  with  his  brother's  politics,  and,  it  may  be 
added,  his  brother's  abilities,  had  great  possibilities 
before  him,  but  he  became  warmly  attached  to  New- 
man, and  to  the  cause.  I  remember  a  discussion  I 
had  with  him  at  Golightly's  lodgings,  opposite  Merton 
Chapel,  on  Canning's  policy.    Warm  I  was  going  to 


8 


REMINISCENCES. 


call  it,  but  tlie  warmth  was  on  my  side,  the  coolness 
on  his.  He  knew  much  moi'e  about  the  matter  than 
I  did,  and  people  seldom  come  well  out  of  a  con- 
troversy if  they  are  not  so  well  informed  as  their 
opponent.  I  might  perhaps  have  known  more  of  the 
matter  before  1825,  but  on  coming  to  Oxford  I  had 
dropped  politics,  and  only  retained  some  general  ideas 
and  personal  antipathies  or  predilections. 

Church,  named  above,  the  present  Dean  of  St. 
Paul's,  brought  high  critical  powers,  and  a  large 
stock  of  that  poetry  and  philosophy  which  are  never 
seen  so  well  as  together,  and  which  enabled  him  to 
invest  with  a  light  new  to  English  eyes  the  career  of 
Anselm,  the  period  and  the  work  of  Dante,  and  the 
christianizing  of  the  Empire.  In  this  he  had  to  en- 
counter Gibbon,  and  to  qualify  Milman. 

George  D.  Ryder,  one  of  Newman's  early  pupils, 
brought  a  name  then  high  in  the  Church  as  well  as 
in  the  State,  much  and  deservedly  reverenced  in  the 
religious  world.  But  he  had  also  qualities  that  made 
him  valuable  as  well  as  dear  to  a  large  circle  of 
friends ;  kindness,  a  quaint  humor,  knowledge  of  men 
and  things,  and  the  finer  perceptions  most  easily 
learnt  in  good  society. 

Medley,  leader  in  Burton's  private  classes,  and, 
after  making  his  mark  in  Devonshire,  Bishop  of 
Newfoundland,  undertook  a  translation  of  Chr^^sos- 
tom.  Charles  Thornton,  bearer  of  a  respected  name, 
and  in  charge  of  what  was  then  a  very  dingy  chapel 
in  Margaret  Street,  undertook  Cyprian.  Hubert 
Cornish,  with  the  talents  and  gentle  manner  of  his 
family,  and  at  that  time  taking  pupils  at  a  curacy, 
undertook  some  of  Chrysostom's  Homilies.  Mac- 
mullen,  with  a  University  career  before  him,  joined 


AIDS  AND  SUPPORTS. 


9 


the  cause  at  every  risk,  and  stood  the  consequences. 
Cotton,  a  man  of  much  power  and  promise,  gave  his 
help. 

Albany  J.  Christie,  of  the  eminent  family  of  auc- 
tioneers, had  come  up  with  special  introductions  from 
Blanco  White  and  Whately,  and  had  taken  high 
honors.  Becoming  Fellow  of  Oriel,  he  took  a  strong 
line  in  favor  of  clerical  celibacy,  and  rendered  New- 
man material  assistance  in  his  edition  of  a  selected 
portion  of  Fleury's  "  Ecclesiastical  History."  He 
finally  entered  the  Roman  Catholic  Church,  and  the 
medical  profession. 

James  Round,  a  Fellow  and  tutor  of  Baliol,  and 
father  of  the  Conservative  member  for  Essex,  gave  a 
hearty  though  safe  contribution  in  an  edition  of  the 
works  of  the  nonjuring  Bishop  Ken.  Dodsworth,  first 
at  Margaret  Street,  then  at  Christ  Church,  Albany 
Street,  early  gave  all  he  had  to  bring  to  the  cause, 
and  followed  Newman  to  Rome. 


CHAPTER  LXX. 


J.  B.  MORRIS,  EDWARD  CASWELL,  AND  DALGAIRNS. 

John  Brande  Morris,  otherwise  "  Jack  Morris," 
or  "  Symeon  Stylites,"  when  I  saw  him  was  occupy- 
ing the  upperiiif)st  story  of  the  tower  over  the  gate- 
way of  Exeter  College.  His  room  was  a  chaos  of 
books,  out  of  which  rose  three  or  four  tall  reading- 
stands,  upon  each  of  which  were  open  folios  in  tiers, 
the  upper  resting  on  the  lower.  The  first  produc- 
tion of  his  pen  that  1  ever  saw  was  "  Nature  a  Par- 
able." Quaint  as  it  is,  and  difficult  as  it  is  occa- 
sionally, it  was  and  is  to  me  a  very  interesting  book. 
Newman  has  always  stood  by  it  most  resolutely,  pro- 
nouncing it  a  beautiful  poem.  There  are  beautiful 
touches  and  beautiful  passages  in  it,  but  I  have  not 
myself  the  courage  to  call  the  whole  beautiful  in  the 
face  of  the  very  strong  expressions  I  sometimes  hear 
to  the  contrary  effect.  You  have  to  understand  and 
accept  a  certain  groundwork,  of  which  this  poem  is 
the  natural  growth.  That  groundwork  is  that  Nat- 
ure is  much  more  than  a  Parable,  at  least  that  a  true 
Christian  makes  it  much  more.  The  book  excited  a 
storm  of  indignant  criticism  when  it  came  out,  and 
from  a  purely  literary  point  of  view  it  was  vulnerable. 
But  where  there  was  so  much  to  be  found  fault  with, 
it  was  hardly  necessary  that  a  reviewer,  finding  a 
line  about  missionaries  ending  with  "  wives  that  eat," 
should  stop  the  quotation  there  and  omit  the  follow- 


J.  B.  MORRIS,  E.  CASWELL,  AND  DALGAIRNS.  11 


ing  line,  signifying  that  they  absorbed  too  much  of 
their  husbands'  time  and  attention.  My  own  opinion 
is  that  Morris  ought  always  to  have  written  nothing 
but  poetry,  and  that  in  that  case  he  might  have  be- 
come a  great  poet.  His  line  of  thought  is  not  one 
that  readily  adapts  itself  to  prose. 

When  I  edited  the  "  British  Critic  "  for  two  years, 
I  received  an  article  from  Morris,  I  believe  the  one 
on  "  Pantheistic  Tendencies,"  April,  1842.  Never 
in  my  life  did  I  see  such  a  crabbed,  complicated, 
twisted,  uninteUigible  piece  of  English.  Though  my 
time  was  precious,  the  day  of  publication  approach- 
ing, MSS.  coming  in,  and  myself  with  much  in  hand, 
I  sat  up  one  whole  night  trying  to  lick  the  cub  into 
shape  ;  to  make  it  comprehensible,  or  at  least  not 
wholly  unfit  to  appear.  Yet  I  doubt  whether  many 
read  the  article,  or  whether  I  did  any  good  by  my 
pains,  except  try  the  writer's  admirable  temper. 

Morris,  I  presume,  wished  to  be  understood.  His 
"Nature  a  Parable"  is  intelligible,  even  though  the 
meaning  lies  under  the  surface,  between  the  lines, 
and  not  always  in  the  text.  But  prose  does  not  gen- 
erally admit  of  letting  the  meaning  play  about  in  the 
air.  In  the  article  I  am  speaking  of  Morris  seemed 
to  aim  at  bringing  as  ma^y  mysteries  as  he  could 
into  a  sentence,  leaving  them  to  struggle  which  would 
first  present  themselves  to  the  reader.  Morris  un- 
derto  k  some  of  Chrysostora's  Homilies.  Whether 
he  excelled  most  as  a  translator  or  as  an  original 
writer  I  could  not  say. 

Edward  Caswell,  also,  was  one  of  the  quaintest  of 
men,  but  he  was  quaint  after  the  manner  of  men. 
He  was  younger  brother  of  Henry  Caswell,  who,  from 
certain  misgivings  as  to  English  Orders,  and  the 


12 


REMINISCENCES. 


political  complications  of  the  English  Church,  took 
American  Orders,  and  wrote  about  the  American  and 
Canadian  churches.  Henry  published  also  an  ac- 
count of  Mormonism,  for  which  purpose  he  visited 
the  "  Prophet  "  in  his  city.  Soon  after  that  he  came 
home  to  spend  the  rest  of  his  days  in  the  heart  of 
Salisbury  Plain.  Edward  had  a  vein  of  humor  all 
his  own.  When  an  undergraduate  he  wrote  the  "Art 
of  Pluck."  This  humor  he  had  to  chastise,  but  it 
occasionally  broke  out,  and  might  be  detected  even 
in  his  serious  writings.  He  loved  to  ho%'er  free  be- 
tween the  seen  and  the  unseen  world. 

He  had  for  some  years  the  charge  of  Stratford- 
sub-Castle,  near  Salisbury,  containing  the  famous 
borough  of  Old  Sarum,  and  himself  occupying  an  old 
mansion  full  of  historical  associations.  When  on  a 
visit  at  his  house,  he  entertained  me  with  the  prob- 
able meditations  of  a  toad  that  had  been  found  under 
the  pavement  of  the  church,  where  it  must  have 
been,  hearing  though  not  seeing  all  that  passed  above, 
for  centuries.  As  Caswell  had  to  leave  early  the 
next  morning,  I  was  asked  to  take  the  eai-ly  daily 
service  for  him.  The  congregation  consisted  of  the 
clerk,  some  school  children,  and  a  bright-looking  old 
fellow,  with  a  full  rubicund  face  and  a  profusion  of 
white  hair.  The  service  over,  the  children  went  to 
the  parsonage  for  the  breakfast  they  had  well  earned. 
The  old  gentleman  hung  behind,  waiting  for  me. 
He  expressed  his  warm  approval  of  the  daily  service. 
When  people  had  nothing  else  to  do,  they  could  not 
do  better  than  say  prayers.  For  his  part  his  work 
was  over,  and  he  was  proud  of  it.  He  had  been  the 
Borough  of  Old  Sarum,  and  had  returned  two  repre- 
sentatives to  Parliament  for  forty  years,  all  honest 


J.  B.  MORRIS,  E.  CASWELL,  AND  DALGAIRNS.  13 


inen  and  gentlemen,  not  tbe  sort  of  fellows  they  were 
sending  to  Parliament  "  in  tliese  days." 

Caswell  followed  Newman  to  Rome,  and  was  for 
many  years  associated  with  him  at  Edgbaston.  His 
wife  had  died  young.  It  was  stated  that  he  gave  all 
her  fortune  to  religious  uses,  —  masses  for  the  repose 
of  her  soul,  so  people  expressed  it,  possibly  putting 
their  own  construction  on  the  matter. 

Dalgairns  was  a  man  whose  very  looks  assured  suc- 
cess in  whatever  he  undertook,  if  only  the  inner  heat, 
which  seemed  to  burn  through  his  eyes,  could  be  well 
regulated.  His  account  of  the  Abbesses  Ang^lique 
and  Marie  des  Anges,  two  leading  figures  in  the  his- 
tory of  Port  Royal,  deserved  the  unqualified  admi- 
ration of  all  sides  ;  but  one  side  at  least  made  the 
discovery  that  these  ladies  did  not  patronize  the  laun- 
dress, or  "  tub,"  quite  as  often  as  is  now  the  custom 
of  genteel  society,  and  heavy  was  the  storm  of  indig- 
nation that  fell  on  Dalgairns.  He  went  with  Newman 
to  Littlemore,  and  thence  to  Edgbaston.  This,  so 
far  as  the  Church  of  England  is  concerned,  was  the 
end  of  a  man  who,  I  feel  sure,  might  have  taken  his 
place  among  the  most  popular  and  instructive  writers 
of  the  age,  and  become  a  household  word  in  England. 

As  I  tell  these  names,  and  feebly  recount  their 
services,  other  names,  and  other  still  pierce  through 
the  haze  of  many  years.  The  constellation  grows,  and 
brightens,  and  surrounds  me.  Some  have  gone  their 
way,  and  I  have  gone  mine.  There  has  been  failure 
and  shortcoming ;  decaj'  of  mental  power,  and  diminu- 
tion of  lustre,  not  without  touch  of  sadder  infirmity. 
There  have  been  mistakes,  miscalculations,  and  ex- 
travagances, with  humbling  and  mortifying  conse- 
quences.    But  in  no  like  cause,  or  like  number  or 


14 


REMINISCENCES. 


kind  of  men,  was  there  ever  less  to  be  remembered 
■with  shame.  If  I  may  estimate  tliem  by  the  measure 
of  my  own  feelings,  they  are  all  good  and  true  men ; 
they  are  a  goodly  company  that  will  never  wholly 
part,  and  what  they  lack  of  present  unity  or  other 
fulfilment,  they  will  hereafter  enjoy. 


CHAPTER  LXXI. 


WILLIAM  FKOUDE. 

William  Froude  gave  his  heart  in  with  his 
brother's  work  at  Oriel,  though  his  turn  even  then 
was  for  science,  and  his  lot  was  eventually  cast  in 
railway  engineering  and  naval  construction.  He  was 
the  chemist  as  well  as  the  mechanist  of  the  college. 
His  rooms  on  the  floor  over  Newman's  were  easily 
distinguishable  to  visitors  entering  the  college,  by  the 
stains,  of  sulphuric  acid  I  think,  extending  from  the 
window  sills  to  the  ground.  The  Provost  must  some- 
times have  had  to  explain  this  appearance  to  his 
inquiring  guests,  as  they  could  not  but  observe  it 
from  his  drawing-room  window. 

He  made  laughing-gas  and  kept  a  depot  in  his 
rooms.  Tliis  was  freely  resorted  to  with  various  and 
ridiculous  results.  It  was  about  this  time  that  an 
officer  superintending  the  recruiting  service,  who  used 
regularly  to  attend  Daubeny's  lectures  in  the  base- 
ment of  the  Ashmolean,  upon  taking  huighing-gas, 
attacked  the  company  so  vigorously  that  in  half  a 
minute  he  had  the  room  to  himself.  One  of  the 
sweetest  tempered  men  I  ever  knew,  upon  taking  the 
gas,  doubled  his  fists,  and  made  menacing  gestures  at 
the  company,  with  a  smile  which  seemed  to  say  that 
he  could  soon  get  the  better  of  us  all  if  he  wished 
it.  Cameron,  no  doubt  from  the  North,  imbibed 
the  harmless  intoxication,  and   immediately  while 

I 


16 


REMINISCENCES. 


retaining  his  sedentary  posture,  revolved  round  his 
seat  as  far  as  the  back  would  allow,  making  a  won- 
derful burring  sound.  He  afterwards  explained  that 
he  had  imagined  himself  a  regiment  of  cavalry  per- 
forming rapid  evolutions. 

I  declined  to  partake  of  either  Daubeny's  gas  or 
W.  Fronde's.  Hurrell  Froude  asked  me  vfhy.  I 
said  I  could  not  voluntarily  put  myself  beyond  my 
own  control.  He  replied,  "  Then  you  must  not  go  to 
bed."  Of  course  the  answer  to  that  is  that  one  must 
sleep,  but  one  need  not  take  laughing-gas,  and  that 
sleep  is  an  ordinance  of  the  Almighty,  which  laugh- 
ing-gas cannot  be  called,  excejjt  in  the  same  sense  that 
alcohol  may  be.  Froude  brought  down  liis  appai'atus 
one  day  to  Henry  Wilberforce's  rooms,  when  Robert 
happened  to  be  there,  myself  also.  Robert  imbibed, 
and  in  a  minute  was  pursuing  us  all  about  the  room 
with  cushions  or  anything  he  could  lay  hold  of. 
While  we  were  all  dodging  him,  James  Bliss  entered 
with  an  old  Oriel  relative,  who  had  high  ideas  of  col- 
lege propriety,  and  was  somewhat  surprised  to  find 
liimself  immediately  belabored  by  a  tutor  he  had 
heard  much  of,  but  never  seen  before. 

William  Froude  took  a  small  Oxford  sailing  boat, 
strengthened  its  frame,  decked  it  fore  and  aft,  and 
himself  made  a  pump  with  which  he  could  discharge 
the  water  as  fast  as  a  waterman  standing  in  the  river 
could  throw  it  in  with  a  bucket.  He  gave  much 
study  and  pains  to  the  work,  putting  it  to  severe 
tests.  His  intention  was  to  sail  down  tlie  Thames 
and  the  Channel,  up  the  Dart,  and  surprise  his  father 
at  Dartington.  But  he  wanted  a  comrade,  as  he 
must  sleep,  and  might  find  himself  in  difiiculties.  He 
asked  me  to  share  the  perils  of  the  voyage.    I  was 


WILLIAM  FROUDE. 


17 


charmed  witli  the  idea,  assented,  and  made  my  plans 
accordingly.  The  day  before  oar  intended  cruise  he 
chanced  to  make  the  timely  discovery  that  I  had  not 
the  least  idea  of  navigation,  and  that  I  trusted  entirely 
to  mother  wit  to  get  me  safe  through.  He  did  not 
think  this  sufficient,  and  either  gave  up  the  scheme 
or  carried  it  out  in  a  very  modified  form,  the  boat 
making  its  appearance  in  the  Dart  somehow  or  other. 

William  Froude  worked  some  years,  under  Brunei, 
in  laying  out  the  Bristol  and  Exeter  Railway,  and 
from  the  way  in  which  I  have  heard  him  speak  of 
his  master's  tendency  to  grand  and  costly  ideas,  I 
conclude  that  he  did  something  to  check  his  extrava- 
gance in  this  part  of  the  Gx'eat  Western  system. 

For  many  years  before  his  death  he  was  labori- 
ously and  anxiously,  but  successfully  employed  in 
experiments  upon  the  respective  resistance  which 
various  forms  of  vessels  meet  with  when  in  motion 
through  water,  and  also  upon  flotation  and  oscilla- 
tion. The  conclusion  come  to,  and  mathematically 
as  well  as  experimentally  demonstrated,  was  that 
there  had  been  great  mistakes.  One  way  of  putting 
it  was  that  whereas  it  had  always  been  supposed  a 
ship  was  a  fish,  it  is  really  a  duck.  It  is  one  of  those 
truths  that  have  only  to  be  pointed  out  and  one  sees 
the  reason.  These  experiments  were  conducted  in  a 
tank  a  hundred  yards  long,  under  a  shed,  with  an 
engine  at  one  end.  The  engine  drew  the  various 
models  through  the  water  at  various  rates  of  speed, 
and  there  was  an  apparatus  for  measuring  the  tension 
of  the  rope,  which  would  of  course  indicate  the  force 
necessary  to  be  employed,  which  would  be  according 
^  to  the  resistance  of  the  water  in  each  case.  Tliere 
was  also  an  apparatus  for  producing  a  storm.    It  is 

VOL.  II.  2. 


18 


REMINISCENCES. 


to  be  feared  the  work  and  the  extreme  delicacy  of 
the  experiments,  not  to  speak  of  tlie  elaborate  calcu- 
lations necessary,  proved  too  much  for  W.  Froude. 
So  it  appeared  to  me  when  I  visited  him  several 
years  before  he  succumbed. 


CHAPTER  LXXII. 


THOMAS  STEVENS. 

Others  there  were,  men  of  position,  hopes  of 
families,  and  destined  pillars  of  society  or  centres  of 
some  local  woi'ld.  Some  had  extraordinary  powers 
not  finding  their  scope  in  the  beaten  track  of  life, 
and  only  to  show  themselves  in  something  approach- 
ing to  eccentricity.  Of  these,  several  contributed  to 
the  movement  their  friendship  and  their  influence, 
with  a  sincerity  costing  their  life's  work,  and  all  they 
had  in  the  world.  One  of  the  first  examples  to  occur 
to  Oriel  men  will  be  Thomas  Stevens,  the  Founder 
and  Warden  of  Bradfield  College. 

It  is  often  said  that  the  child  is  father  of  the  man, 
but  the  child  is  more  easily  seen  in  the  man,  than  the 
man  in  the  child.  To  be  the  founder  of  a  public 
school,  designed  to  emulate,  and  in  some  important 
respects  to  surpass,  those  which  are  among  the  glories 
of  England,  was  about  the  very  last  thing  that  could 
have  been  imagined  of  "  Tom  Stevens."  Nobody 
so  easy,  nobody  so  pleasant  to  get  on  with,  nobody 
so  full  and  overflowing  with  practical  matters.  But 
classics  and  literature  did  not  seem  his  line.  He  was 
a  true  child  of  Nature,  and  of  her  kindliest  mould. 
There  was  a  homely  wit  and  rural  dignity  about  him 
that  always  recalled  green  fields,  water-rights,  tim- 
ber-falling, and  harvest  time.  Such  a  character  was 
a  pleasant  contrast  to  those  who  had  their  fortunes 


20 


REMINISCENCES. 


still  to  make,  or  had  had  large  fortunes  provided  for 
them.  The  heir  of  two  or  three  thousand  acres  is 
but  a  small  man  compared  with  the  heir  of  half  a 
county,  or  better  still  half  a  suburb.  But  there  was 
something  free,  ready,  and  wholesome  in  Stevens' 
talk,  that  usually  seemed  solid  ground  to  rest  upon. 

He  had  a  troop  of  friends  about  him,  always  at 
home  there.  Like  most  genial  men  he  had  special 
couimand  over  nature,  as  well  as  the  human  kind  ; 
though  I  think  it  was  not  he,  but  his  friend  John 
Marriott,  who  could  call  a  cuckoo  and  make  it  perch 
a  few  yards  from  him.  Thomas  Stevens  kept  a  tame 
snake  in  his  room,  which  he  could  whistle  out  of  its 
hole  in  the  floor  for  a  saucer  of  milk  at  breakfast 
time.  He  rented  an  apartment  in  the  town  where 
he  used  to  employ  himself,  properly  armed  and  at- 
tired, for  hours  in  stuffing  birds.  Going  out  one 
morning  with  his  gun  to  Bagley  Wood,  he  bronght 
home  fifty  different  species  and  varieties.  But  there 
were  arriving  also,  in  various  stages  of  preservation, 
birds  from  Norway  and  other  countries.  The  museum 
he  established  at  Bradfield  soon  contained  two  hun- 
dred and  fifty  specimens,  all  of  his  own  stuffing. 
Every  now  and  then  Stevens  had  to  go  home,  and 
sacrifice  a  term,  in  looking  after  his  father's  property, 
for  his  father  was  squire  as  well  as  rector,  and  in 
years.  When  he  returned  to  college  it  was  to  talk 
of  saw-mills,  crops,  wages,  and  poor-rates. 

Not  very  long  after  taking  his  degree,  Stevens 
formed  his  own  Poor  Law  Union,  and  had  some 
very  hard  fights  with  the  prejudices  which  prevailed 
against  the  new  system.  The  Bradfield  Poor  Law 
Union  was  so  well  formed,  and  worked  so  well,  that 
the  department  pressed  him  into  its  service,  and 


THOMAS  STEVENS. 


21 


made  him  Assistant  Poor  Law  Commissioner.  In 
that  capacity  he  drove  over  the  country  far  and  wide, 
wherever  there  was  a  bit  of  rough  work  to  be  done, 
a  refractory  Board  of  Guardians,  or  some  old  Par- 
liamentary Union  obstinately  persisting  in  its  own 
lines. 

Stevens  had  at  last  to  take  orders  and  settle.  His 
father's  friends  told  him  he  must  do  as  his  fathers 
had  done,  for  they  had  been  rectors  and  squires  of 
Bradfield  for  two  centuries.  But  Stevens  inherited 
a  practical  genius  which  could  not  find  its  whole 
sphere  even  in  this  double  character.  It  is  not  very 
difficult  to  hold  to  one  career,  but  when  a  man  has 
added  a  second  to  it  he  immediately  wants  a  third. 
There  are  "  Jacks  of  all  trades,"  but  never  of  two. 

An  ancestor  of  Stevens  had  been  captain-general 
of  Charles  I.'s  wagon  train,  or  transport  service,  and 
in  constant  communication  with  that  king  and  his 
ministers,  at  Oxford  and  elsewhere.  He  had  man- 
aged to  keep  them  and  their  horses  well  supplied 
with  food  and  other  requisites  under  very  difficult 
circumstances,  doing  much  of  his  work  by  night,  and 
making  distant  forays,  with  the  connivance  of  the 
Royalist  proprietors,  whose  corn,  hay,  and  straw  he 
carried  off  to  the  Royalist  headquarters. 

Stevens  was  nephew  of  Tinney,  the  eminent 
Chancery  lawyer,  and  had  thus  legal  as  well  as  prac- 
tical ability  in  his  blood.  When,  tlierefore,  on  the 
death  of  his  father,  he  finally  settled  in  his  double 
position  at  Bradfield,  it  was  on  the  express  condition 
that  he  was  to  do  "something,"  Whatever  he  did 
grew  in  his  hands.  Perhaps  the  spirit  of  Oriel,  and 
the  contagion  of  Newman,  told  in  that.  He  put  his 
hand  to  his  village  church,  and  it  became  a  small 


I 


22 


REMIXISCENCES. 


cathedral.  The  little  organ  grew  into  a  big  one. 
Two  or  thi'ee  village  lads  multiplied  into  a  choir. 
They  must  have  some  education,  and  so  there  came 
a  good  school  ;  two  indeed,  one  better  than  the  other. 
The  better  school  grew  into  a  college,  with  magnifi- 
cent buildings,  on  Stevens'  own  land,  a  few  hundred 
yards  from  his  front  windows.  He  trained  his  own 
artisans.  A  lad  was  apprenticed  to  him  to  learn  the 
trade  of  a  blacksmith,  and  became  a  second  Quentin 
Matsys,  and  might  perhaps  have  grown  into  au 
Apelles.  But  the  founder  had  to  be  warden,  and  to 
maintain  the  life  of  the  college  as  well  as  its  bodily 
frame.  He  had  to  manage  schoolmasters,  a  race  that 
loves  its  own  way,  and  cannot  easily  work  in  harness. 

Who  could  have  expected  such  a  development  from 
the  bird-stufTer  and  land-bailiff?  Yet  it  can  be  easily 
traced  backwards,  especially  if  we  take  into  account 
the  element  of  a  nobler  ambition  supplied  by  a  resi- 
dence in  those  davs  in  the  circle  of  Newman's  friends 
at  Oriel  College.  The  generous  flame  caught  a  rich 
material,  and  it  burnt  well. 

That  there  was  a  vast  and  lamentable  intermixture 
of  error  in  all  this  outcome  is  no  more  than  must 
be  admitted  of  all  movements  whatever.  There  was 
much  exaggeration  ;  there  was  excessive  self-confi- 
dence ;  there  was  often  the  disregard  of  sound  advice 
and  the  plain  dictates  of  common  sense;  thei'e  was 
the  reading  of  providence  by  the  light  of  one's  own 
inclination,  and  there  was  even  a  neglect  of  the 
homely  maxim,  "  Be  just  before  you  are  generous." 
The  fate  of  Radley  I  have  to  tell.  The  elder  of 
the  two  Monroes,  who  were  at  Oriel  about  this  time, 
founded  a  school  at  Harrow  Weald  for  the  trans- 
mutation of  raw  ploughboys  into  sweet  choristers  and 


THOMAS  STEVENS. 


23 


good  scholars,  and  he  easily  obtained  the  assistance 
of  confiding  college  friends,  philanthropists,  and  dig- 
nitaries. It  was  a  forcing-house,  and  wanted  money 
to  keep  it  going;  money,  and  more  money.  When 
that  failed,  the  little  paradise  collapsed,  and  Monro 
found  himself  and  his  poor  protiges  under  the  iron 
heel  of  vulgar  necessity. 

Bradfield  College  survives,  but  has  ruined  its 
founder.  He  started  in  that  complex  and  absolute 
position  which  Englishmen  seem  to  have  a  special 
weakness  for,  and  Aviiich  they  seem  to  tolerate  in 
everything  and  everybody,  except  the  Pope.  He 
was  rector,  squire,  priest,  and  king.  His  house  was 
parsonage  and  mansion,  all  in  one.  To  this  hybrid 
form  he  must  add  the  material  plant,  and  the  warden- 
ship  of  a  most  magnificent  college.  It  was  calculated 
to  flourish  and  pay  its  way  on  150  scholars,  and  there 
really  seemed  no  reason  why  it  should  not  attain  that 
measure  of  popularity,  and  even  exceed  it.  But  the 
competition,  both  that  from  the  beginning  and  that 
which  came  after,  was  overwhelming.  Marlborough 
was  already  in  the  field,  Woodard  was  now  starting 
his  first,  second,  and  third-class  schools  all  over  the 
kingdom.  Wellington  College  rose  like  a  mirage  in 
a  summer's  day,  peopling  a  waste.  Reading  devel- 
oped a  public  school.  All  the  public  schools  were 
putting  on  steam.  Charterhouse  went  down  into  the 
country  within  a  walk  of  Berkshire,  which,  with  Eton 
at  one  end  and  Oxford  at  the  other,  and  half  a  dozen 
private  schools  midway,  was  now  the  school-ground 
of  England.  These  rivals  had  the  benefit  of  ancient 
foundations,  noble  and  wealthy  benefactors,  national 
subscriptions,  or  Royal  patronage  ;  some  had  a  strong 
hereditary  hold  on  the  best  blood  of  the  nation. 


24 


REJflNISCENCES. 


Stevens  had  to  do  everything  himself.  Every  pound 
in  his  pocket,  every  acre,  every  brick  and  stone,  in 
his  ancient  patrimony,  did  the  Warden  of  Bi'adfield 
College  throw  into  the  tremendous  venture,  fighting 
against  such  odds  as  no  hero  of  romance  ever  en- 
countered. It  was  all  in  vain,  and  Bradfield  College 
has  now  that  touch  of  tragic  interest  which  in  one 
way  or  another  is  ever  to  be  found  in  the  noblest  of 
human  enterprises. 


CHAPTER  LXXIII. 


WILT  J  AM  SEWELL. 

William  Sewell,  the  founder  of  Radley  College, 
■was  for  a  long  time  one  of  the  most  prominent  men 
in  the  University,  and  always  before  the  public  as  the 
most  industx'ious  of  readers  and  of  writers.  Had  he 
thought  a  little  more  he  might  have  written  to  more 
purpose ;  and  had  he  tried  for  less  he  might  have 
obtained  more.  Newman  observed  that  he  had  a 
word  ready  for  everything.  His  words  and  his  ideas 
thus  fitted  too  quickly,  and  he  never  had  occasion 
to  see  them  better  mated,  or  to  improve  either  his 
conceptions  or  his  expi'essions.  Hard  tliinkers  like 
Hampden  called  him  namby-pamby,  that  is,  with- 
out solidity,  consistency,  and  formation.  He  had  an 
exuberance  of  style  which  oddly  corresponded  to  the 
rotundity  of  his  face  and  form.  However,  there  was 
fire  within,  and  he  was  ambitious  and  enterprising. 
His  rooms  were  a  show. 

When  the  Professorship  of  IVIoral  Philosophy  was 
founded  or  revived,  it  suggested  itself  to  a  good  many 
minds  not  likely,  for  one  reason  or  another,  to  find  a 
vocation  in  any  other  professorship.  Sewell,  to  be 
beforehand,  established  a  Moral  Philosophy  Club, 
which  was  to  meet  at  the  members'  rooms  in  succes- 
sion, to  hear  papers  and  to  hold  discussions.  In  effect 
it  was  he  who  wrote  and  he  who  talked,  for  the  rest 
were  unprepared,  and  he  was  always  well  prepared ; 


26 


REMINISCENCES. 


indeed,  only  too  happy  to  make  up  for  everybody's 
default.  This  proved  a  great  encouragement  to  the 
general  idleness. 

On  one  occasion,  when  all  were  assembled  at  Sew- 
ell's  own  rooms,  and  nobody  had  anything  to  read 
or  to  say,  Sewell,  rose  to  the  rescue.  He  had  been 
reading  a  very  learned  woi'k  on  the  interior  history 
of  Mahoraedanism.  It  presented  in  all  respects  the 
most  marvelhms  correspondence  to  the  history  of 
the  Christian  Church  ;  exactly  corresponding  schools, 
sects,  divisions,  controversies,  tendencies,  shades  of 
thought,  and  varieties  of  practice.  Point  at  anything 
in  the  Christian  Church,  and  Sewell  could  put  his 
finger  on  the  Mahomedan  equivalent.  Mutato  nomine, 
the  two  things  were  the  same;  that  is,  the  same  mor- 
ally and  intellectually,  and  in  what  most  people  hold 
to  be  the  substance  of  religion.  Sewell  gave  illustra- 
tions, and  named  the  Fathers,  the  Reformers,  the 
leaders  of  thought,  and  the  founders  of  schools  in 
Mahomedanism,  the  very  counterpart  of  our  own.  In 
truth,  Cffisar  was  very  like  Pompey,  and  as  to  be  like 
is  a  feminine  and  dependent  quality,  it  followed  that 
Mahomedanism  was  the  likest  of  the  two.  Sewell 
was  still  dilating  in  this  strain,  and  seemingly  on  the 
eve  of  still  more  startling  disclosures,  when  the  clock 
told  us  time  was  up.  The  club  looked  like  a  club ; 
it  said  nothing,  asked  no  questions,  and  parted,  sadder 
perhaps,  but  not  very  much  the  wiser.  There  was  not 
much  gained  by  having  it  made  out  so  satisfactorily 
that  Turk  is  only  another  name  for  Christian,  that 
is,  for  the  Christian  corresponding  to  the  Turkish 
variety. 

At  another  meeting  of  the  club  in  Oriel  College, 
Sewell  had  made  a  great  coup.    He  had  got  Jacob- 


WILLIAM  SEWELL. 


27 


son  to  come.  The  discussion  was  desultoiy ;  but 
Sewell  had  contributed  so  ample  a  share  that  he 
could  justly  claim  the  honors  of  the  day.  Turning 
round,  he  rallied  some  of  the  members  on  the  small- 
ness  of  their  contributions  to  the  day's  entertainment. 
They  were  used  to  it,  and  submitted.  He  felt  em- 
boldened to  attack  the  new  member.  "  Jacobson,  I 
think  you 've  said  nothing  to  be  remembered."  "Nor 
heard,"  was  all  the  I'eply ;  and  so  began  and  ended 
Jacobson 's  relations  to  the  club. 

Jacobson  cannot  be  named  without  a  word  more. 
To  think  of  a  man  being  the  dear,  admired,  and 
trusted  friend  of  two  such  different  and  differently 
circumstanced  men  as  Henry  Wilberforce  and  John 
Thaddeus  Delane,  the  late  and  long  editor  of  the 
"  Times  "  !  Newman,  I  must  say,  was  a  little  sur- 
prised when  Jacobson  took  charge  of  IfHey,  delivered 
seventeen  discourses,  published  them  as  Parochial 
Sermons,  and  gave  up  his  charge. 

But  to  return  to  W.  Sewell.  He  became  Professor 
of  Moral  Philosophy,  and  was  considered  to  do  New- 
man good  service  both  as  professor  and  also  as  a 
writer  of  reviews.  In  1839  there  was  a  more  im- 
portant professorship,  that  of  Logic,  to  be  filled.  The 
University  itself,  it  should  be  borne  in  mind,  had  lit- 
tle to  give  in  those  days,  while  the  expectants  were 
many.  The  final  list  of  candidates  for  this  position 
was  Mitchell,  Lowe,  Vaughan,  Wall,  Stocker,  Lan- 
caster, Sewell,  and  Hill  of  St.  Edmund  Hall.  In  the 
letter  from  Rogers,  now  Lord  Blachford,  containing 
the  list,  and  dated  May  24,  1839,  every  name  is  un- 
derlined to  show  the  extraordinary  character  of  the 
conjunction.  How  many  more  lines  might  he  add 
now  !    Sewell  had  called  on  Newman.    He  had  been 


28 


REJIINISCENCES. 


a  little  afraid  that  by  jumping  into  the  candidature 
he  might  incur  the  opposition  of  Newman,  or  of  his 
friends.  So  he  came  with  a  sop.  This  was  nothing 
less  than  a  hope,  implying  the  use  of  his  influence, 
that  upon  his  own  election  to  the  chair  of  Logic 
Newman  might  succeed  to  his  own  cast-ofE  shoes, 
that  is,  the  chair  of  Moral  Philosophy.  He  would 
use  his  influence  for  Newman  in  that  matter,  even 
though  it  would  not  be  without  some  sacrifice,  for  he 
did  apprehend  that  Newman's  treatment  of  moral 
philosophy  might  diverge  from  his  own.  However, 
the  word  was  passed  among  Newman's  friends  to 
support  Sewell,  and  that  earnestly. 

Four  years  before  this,  in  1835,  Sewell  had  offered 
himself  for  the  head-mastership  of  Winchester  Col- 
lege, when  Moberly  was  elected.  He  was  said  to 
be  much  disappointed.  As  tutor  of  his  college,  he 
did  little  else  but  talk  to  his  pupils,  especially  those 
that  he  thought  he  could  most  rely  on  to  benefit  by 
his  talking,  or  who  might  become  men  of  influence. 
The  result  was  they  got  wearied  with  his  talk  ;  for- 
got it;  didn't  get  up  their  books,  and  lost  their 
honors. 

Sewell  stai-ted  Radley  College,  literally  squatting, 
that  is,  holding  by  a  temporary  and  precarious  tenure, 
on  the  estate  to  which  Sir  George  Bowj'er  has  now 
long  succeeded.  The  institution  was  made  the  op- 
portunity of  some  grand  experiments,  and  of  course 
was  over-built,  and  had  to  go  through  the  common 
experience  of  economical  reverses.  There  ensued  a 
sad  deficit,  ascribed  to  a  careless  and  unbusiness-like 
brother,  who  had  the  management  of  the  accounts. 

Henry  Wilberforce  sent  a  dear  son  there,  who  died 
at  the  college,  as  the  parents  thought,  grossly  neg- 


WILLIAM  SEWELL. 


29 


lected,  and  without  their  being  prepared  for  the  sad 
news.  Henry  hastened  to  Radley,  but  instead  of 
being  allowed  to  vent  his  grief  and  complaints,  he 
found  himself  soundly  rated  by  Sewell  for  sending  so 
delicate  a  child  there,  and  injuring,  by  his  inevitable 
death,  the  good  name  of  the  college. 

The  system  pursued  was  mediasval,  as  far  as  names 
could  go.  Sewell  himself  was  warden,  and  delighted 
in  the  exercise  of  monastic  discipline  and  the  use 
of  monastic  phraseology.  The  religious  newspapers 
were  appalled  to  hear  that  Radley  boys  went  every 
night  to  their  "  cubicles."  However,  the  college  holds 
its  gi'ound,  and  is  one  outcome  of  the  Oxford  move- 
ment ;  so  at  least  its  enemies  have  long  been  pro- 
claiming. 


CHAPTER  LXXIV. 


JAMES  ANTHONY  FEOUDE. 

Among  the  Oriel  worthies  associated  with  the 
movement  is  one  who  stands  in  a  very  different  cate- 
gory from  the  above.  I  cannot  pass  without  notice 
James  Anthony  Froude,  for  he  has  invited  a  con- 
troversy as  to  his  relations  with  Newman  and  the 
"Tractarians,"  and  has  himself  contributed  to  it  with 
some  variety  of  feeling  and  expression.  It  is  plainly 
a  matter  in  which  it  is  allowable,  and  indeed  impor- 
tant, that  I  should  present  my  monograph  of  one 
who  has  had  a  very  peculiar  and  significant  part  as- 
signed to  him  in  these  discussions,  and  who  has 
become  one  of  our  first  essayists,  historians,  and 
politicians. 

Besides  my  long  friendship  with  the  two  elder 
brothers,  I  resided  at  Oriel  during  the  first  year  of 
Anthony's  undergraduateship  ;  I  was  in  the  same 
staircase  with  him,  and  had  official  relations  to  him. 
I  ceased  to  be  a  Fellow  in  September,  1836,  and  from 
that  date  I  resided  in  Salisbury  Plain ;  but  I  had  a 
brother  then  residing  in  the  college,  another  brother 
residing  in  Oxford,  and  Newman  was  then  my 
brother-in-law.  With  all  thesa  I  was  in  correspond- 
ence, and  was  occasionally  seeing  them,  and  visiting 
Oxford. 

The  first  thing  I  heard  about  Anthony  Froude  was 
that  immediately  upon  coming  up  he  showed  himself 


JAMES  ANTHONY  FROUDE. 


31 


very  shy  of  Newman.  It  was  Newman,  probably,  who 
had  managed  that  he  should  have  his  brother's  old 
rooms,  over  his  own,  and  this  he  objected  to.  He 
was  not  going  to  be  in  leading-strings.  Newman  had 
parties,  chiefly  undergraduate,  in  the  common  room 
every  Tuesday  evening,  and  he  could  not  fail  to  in- 
vite the  brother  of  his  two  old  friends,  but  I  believe 
I  am  right  in  saying  that  Anthony  seldom  came.  My 
brother  James  was  engaged  in  the  most '  laborious 
work  of  his  laborious  life,  editing  the  "  Remains  of 
Richard  Hurrell  Froude,"  but  I  do  not  believe  he  had 
much,  if  any,  communication  with  Anthony.  All 
this  was  quite  compatible  with  a  high  admiration  of 
I  Newman's  character,  preaching,  talking,  and  writing. 
That  admiration  was  then  shared  by  many  at  Oxford, 
and  elsewhere,  who  after  allowing  themselves  to  be 
carried  away  by  a  chain  of  argument  or  a  flow  of 
eloquence,  would  suddenly  break  the  spell,  as  they 
felt  it  to  be,  by  a  violent  protest.  Anthony  Froude 
had  a  great  admiration  for  his  father  and  for  his 
brother,  but  while  he  admired  he  felt  oppressed  and 
repelled.  The  mightier  the  influence,  the  more  he 
struggled  against  it.  I  believe  he  felt  the  same  ne- 
cessity for  self-assertion  in  regard  to  Newman.  He 
certainly  derived  much  of  his  style  from  Newman, 
for  it  is  hard  to  say  whom  else  he  could  have  derived 
it  from.  It  is  far  more  imaginative  and  poetic  ;  far 
more  capable  of  carrying  the  reader  away,  and  plac- 
ing him  in  a  new  and  unexpected  position,  than  tho 
style  of  any  one  else  about  him.  But  if,  under  this 
fascination,  feeling  it,  and  to  some  extent  yielding  to 
it,  Anthony  kept  the  party  and  the  movement  at 
arm's  length,  and  did  it  perhaps  rather  roughly,  there 
was  nothing  to  blame  in  it,  or  even  to  remark  upon. 


32 


REMINISCENCES. 


Why  should  a  young  fellow  of  seventeen  or  eighteen, 
coming  to  Oxford,  for  study,  for  society,  for  amuse- 
ment, for  honors,  and  for  getting  on  in  the  world, 
bother  himself  about  such  matters  as  the  Tracts  were 
"written  upon  ?  Whj^  should  he  busy  himself  in  all 
the  details  of  Becket's  career,  commit  himself  against 
the  Royal  Supremacy,  and  bewilder  himself  amongst 
the  Early  Fathers  ?  If  he  had  consulted  the  Provost 
I  am  quite  sure  the  Provost  would  have  advised  him 
to  leave  all  these  things  alone,  and  devote  himself  to 
his  college  course ;  and  I  am  not  sure  I  should  not 
have  done  the  same. 

But  this  is  a  question  of  fact,  and  the  fact  is  that 
Anthony  Froude  kept  aloof  not  only  from  Newman's 
friends,  but  from  most  Oriel  society.  Something  had 
happened  to  him,  and  he  was  hardly  quite  himself 
most  of  his  undergraduateship.  There  was  a  story 
that  he  had  been  disappointed  in  a  love  affair,  but  it 
was  early  days  for  that.  He  only  knew  what  was  in 
his  head,  but  he  was  so  unapproachable  that  Oriel  is 
not  answerable  for  it.  Everybody  knows  that  a  man 
may  live  in  a  college,  and  yet  be  no  more  of  the  col- 
lege than  he  can  become  a  horse  by  living  in  a  stable. 
His  habits  and  amusements  were  solitary. 

This  perfectly  independent  course  Anthony  Froude 
pursued  till  he  became  Fellow  of  Exeter.  Newman 
had  felt  the  disappointment,  but  he  had  been  power- 
less to  prevent  it,  and  had  perhaps  been  too  busy  to 
make  the  attempt.  Anthony's  own  account  of  him- 
self, and  his  early  recollections,  and  not  less  what  all 
the  world  may  now  see  in  his  writings,  throw  some 
light  on  the  mystery  of  his  early  college  life.  He 
combined  in  a  rare  degree  self-confidence,  imagina- 
tion, and  inquiry ;  and  he  very  early  encountered  and 


JAMES  ANTHONY  FROUDE. 


33 


felt  the  antagonism  of  authority.  Parents  laid  down 
the  law,  no  matter  in  what  direction,  just  as  peremp- 
torily, and  often  as  harshly,  sixty  years  ago,  as  they 
do  now.  Youthful  divers  into  the  abyss  were  then 
pulled  up  quite  as  sharply  by  their  less  audacious  eld- 
ers as  they  can  be  now. 

There  was  a  sort  of  stoicism  about  Archdeacon 
Fronde's  character  which  sometimes  surprised  those 
who  had  only  seen  him  for  a  day  or  two,  conversing, 
or  sketching,  or  sight-seeing.  He  once  rather  shocked 
his  clergy  by  .delivering  a  charge  while  a  ver}'  dear 
daughter  was  lying  dead  in  his  house  ;  but  there  was 
a  romantic  conception  of  duty  in  the  act  which  af- 
fords some  key  to  Richard  Hurrell's  character.  From 
his  early  years  Anthony  felt  chilled,  crushed,  and  fet- 
tered. So  at  least  say  those  who  are  better  acquainted 
Avith  his  books  than  I  am. 

Any  one  has  only  to  put  the  dates  together  to  see 
that  Anthony  can  have  seen  very  little  indeed  of  his 
brother  Richard  Hurrell  at  an  age  to  derive  any  im- 
pression from  him,  or  to  be  conscious  of  agreement  or 
disagreement.  Public  schools  and  universities  sepa- 
rate men  from  their  families,  and  brother  from  brother 
very  much ;  Arnold  observes  in  one  of  his  sermons, 
too  much.  All  regularly  meet  at  Christmas  in  a 
round  of  small  festivities  ;  many  meet  at  Easter  for  a 
mere  sight  of  one  another ;  and  during  August  and 
the  first  fortnight  of  September,  young  men  and  boys 
are  commonly  on  their  wanderings.  While  Hurrell 
Fronde  was  at  Oriel,  Anthony  was  some  years  at 
Westminster.  Early  in  1832,  there  were  indications 
of  Hurrell's  fatal  illness,  and  as  soon  as  it  could  be 
mannged,  he  sailed  for  the  Mediterranean.  Anthony 
was  tlien  fourteen.    If  anything  can  be  concluded 

VOL,  It.  .3. 


KEMINISCENCES. 


from  Hurrell's  published  letters  about  this  time  to 
his  brother  William,  he  might  be  advising  Anthony 
to  read  the  Bible,  and  some  work  of  a  theological 
character,  and  to  beware  of  Liberalism.  Hurrell  re- 
turned from  the  Mediterranean  next  summer ;  paid 
as  many  visits  as  he  could  manage  in  three  or  four 
months,  and  then  went  to  Barbadoes,  from  which  he 
returned  to  Oxford  in  the  summer  term  of  1835. 

Anthony,  then  seventeen,  was  summoned  from  his 
tutor  at  the  village  of  Merton  to  meet  him  for  two  or 
three  days.  There  was  then  a  double  bar  to  commu- 
nication between  them,  even  if  there  could  have  been 
serious  communication  in  such  a  bustle,  and  in  so 
short  a  time.  Hurrell  was  incessantly  talking  about 
all  sorts  of  thincjs,  it  must  be  admitted  returninoj  to 
the  Liberals  very  often ;  and  Anthony  was  in  the 
clouds.  Later  in  that  year  the  two  brothers  might 
see  more  of  one  another  at  Dartington,  but  Hurrell 
was  then  a  dying  man,  strong  enough  to  testify,  and 
likely  enough  to  do  so,  yet  not  to  be  accused  of  tyr- 
anny, or  of  making  an  undue  use  of  his  seniority,  if 
he  spoke  his  mind  plainly  to  a  brother  so  much  his 
junior,  and  in  that  state  of  haze  which  might  suggest 
misgivings. 

Such  are  the  simple  facts  of  the  case,  and  if  any 
one  will  compare  the  dates,  and  consider  the  circum- 
stances, he  will  see  that  they  afford  little  ground  for 
two  misconceptions  that  have  arisen,  and  which  An- 
thony has  himself  unfortunately  favored.  One  of 
these  misconceptions  is  that  there  was  an  undue  and 
overpowering  pressure  on  his  intellect  and  belief, 
by  various  relatives,  elders,  and  acquaintances  ;  the 
other,  that  under  this  pressure  he  became  a  Trac- 
tarian,  or  whatever  else  the  thing  is  to  be  called, 


JAMES  ANTHONY  FROUDE. 


35 


and  had  afterwards  to  extricate  himself  from  this 
false  position  by  an  effort  which  cost  him  his  faith 
altogether. 

I  am  sorry  to  say  I  never  read  Anthony's  books 
embodying  these  misconceptions,  though  I  might  have 
seen  them  lying  on  a  table  here  or  there.  I  was  not 
much  in  the  way  of  the  current  literature  then,  and 
had  not  much  time  or  money  either.  But  I  was  pain- 
fully aware  of  the  fact  that  something  like  a  yell  of 
triumph  was  raised  in  certain  circles  —  there  are 
examples  of  it  in  Whately's  and  Hampden's  corre- 
spondence —  at  what  was  now  described  as  the  legit- 
imate result  of  excessive  demands  upon  faith.  Grave 
writers  began  to  point  out,  what  is  very  questiona- 
ble indeed,  that  infidelity  is  the  outcome  of  Roman 
Catholicism,  not  of  Protestantism,  and  that  its  birth- 
place is  not  Germany,  or  England,  but  France. 

I  do  not  think  that  a  single  being  in  Oriel  inter- 
fered in  the  slightest  dt^gree  with  Anthony  Fronde's 
religious  convictions  while  he  was  there.  For  the 
time  I  was  at  college  with  him  I  had  relations  with 
him  as  Censor  Theolo(/icus,  in  which  capacity  I  might 
be  supposed  at  liberty  to  make  any  demands  on  An- 
thony's faith  or  submission.  But  all  I  had  to  do  was 
to  look  over  his  sermon  notes,  and  satisfy  myself  as 
well  as  I  could  that  he  Iiad  been  at  one  of  the  Uni- 
versity sermons,  and  had  given  some  attention  to  it. 
In  this  capacity  I  can  answer  for  it  that  nothing  re- 
markable passed  between  me  and  Anthony,  unless  it 
be  that  Anthony,  having  once  hurt  his  knee,  begged 
leave  to  analyze  any  sermon  I  might  name  instead  of 
walking  to  St.  Mary's.  Moreover,  the  Provost  had 
the  ovei'hauling  of  the  "Notes  "  at  the  "  Collections," 
and  as  he  turned  the  leaves  rapidly  over,  he  naturally 


86 


EEMINISCENCES. 


availed  himself  of  the  Censor's  annotations,  to  dis- 
cover the  questionable  passages  in  the  undergradu- 
ate's text. 

lu  1842  Anthony  Froude  was  elected  Fellow  of 
Exeter.  If  Sewell  then  made  a  set  at  him,  it  would 
only  amuse  Anthony,  and  moreover  it  would  not  be 
in  the  lines  of  the  movement,  from  Avhich  Sewell  kept 
almost  as  clear  as  he.  However,  in  a  year  or  two,  it 
reached  Oriel  College  that  Anthony  was  very  much 
disturbing  the  serious  members  of  his  new  college  by 
the  boldness  of  his  speculations,  and  by  the  pleasure 
he  seemed  to  feel  in  destructive  paradoxes.  Very  sad 
suspicions  were  entertained. 

After  a  time  a  reaction  was  reported.  Anthony, 
it  was  said,  wanted  employment,  and  felt  that  he  had 
no  right  to  expect  happiness  in  religion,  if  he  was  not 
working  for  it.  Such  a  report  reached  Newman,  and 
in  such  a  form  that  he  thought  the  time  had  come, 
and  indeed  that  there  was  a  providential  opening,  for 
him  to  invite  Anthony's  assistance. 

Then  comes  the  question  which  no  man  can 
answer.  Why  did  Newman  pick  out  from  all  the 
extraordinary  Lives  of  Saints,  the  most  extraordi- 
naiy,  and  the  most  surpassing  belief,  for  Anthony  to 
shatter  what  was  left  of  his  convictions  upon.  The 
story  ran  in  Oxford  that  Anthony  accepted  the 
task,  and  was  very  soon  discussing  it  in  college  with 
more  and  more  freedom.  It  was  even  added  that 
while  translating  this  mass  of  legends  for  Newman, 
he  was  indulging  in  a  by-play,  a  bit  of  inventive 
hagiography  or  satire  on  the  work  before  him.  As 
Baden  Powell  was  distinguishing  himself  in  this 
line,  perhaps  Anthony  Froude  may  have  got  the 
credit. 


JAMES  ANTHONY  FROUDE. 


37 


The  result  was  a  sudden  snap  of  the  slight  and 
precarious  tie.  There  had  never  been  any  real  join- 
ing, and  where  the  old  crack  had  been  there  was  now 
a  complete  fracture.  But  it  is  a  very  old  story,  and 
a  very  universal  story,  to  plead  an  abuse  of  faith 
as  an  extenuation  of  unbelief.  Nor  is  it  a  logical 
process,  for  it  implies  that  unbelief  wants  extenua- 
tion, and  that  in  faith  there  is  a  just  mean.  Hamp- 
den immediately  seized  on  it  as  "  a  valuable  evidence 
of  the  working  of  Tractarianism,"  which  he  described 
as    a  general  corruption  of  moral  feeling." 

Anthony  P'roude  has  latterly  reviewed  the  story 
of  his  life,  and  of  his  own  feelings,  with  more  consid- 
eration, and  more  knowledge  of  the  world.  In  the 
ordinary  sense  of  the  word,  his  career  has  been  a  re- 
action against  the  movement.  The  same  may  be  said 
of  the  many  writers  who  have  only  protested  against 
it  with  increasing  animosity  and  decision  from  the 
day  it  showed  itself,  and  who  never  had  a  spark  of 
sympathy  with  it.  But  that  is  very  different  from 
the  reaction  imagined  by  Newman's  opponents  for 
Anthony  Froude. 


CHAPTER  LXXV. 


THE  SACRIFICE  AND  THE  WORK. 

]\Iany  of  the  above,  and  many  more  that  could  be 
named,  had  taken  high  University  honors,  had  won 
prizes,  and  were  in  University  offices,  then  more  than 
now  the  road  to  the  highest  promotion.  They  sacri- 
ficed a  good  deal  to  what  they  must  have  considered 
the  obligation  of  diity  and  of  truth,  exposing  that  for 
the  time  to  some  degree  of  obloquy  also.  They  were 
denounced  and  abused  from  pulpits  and  platforms ; 
by  controversialists  and  novelists,  and  by  many 
whose  good  opinion  they  could  not  but  grieve  to  have 
lost.  Most  of  these  volunteers  to  the  standard  of 
truth,  as  they  deemed  it,  would  have  been  much 
greater  men  in  their  own  original  lines.  Nay,  the 
coast  was  all  the  clearer,  and  the  competition  the  less 
fierce,  for  the  number  of  those  that  were  leaving  the 
great  highway  to  eminence,  and  taking  a  side  path 
leading  to  nothing  in  this  world. 

It  is  true  that  common  action  and  the  spirit  of  a 
common  cause  keep  up  the  fire  and  light  of  life,  foster 
many  virtues,  and  bring  out  unknown  powers.  But 
what  was  the  common  action  to  which  many  of  tliese 
men  of  mark,  of  genius,  and  of  high  expectations 
were  taking  themselves  ?  INIany  of  tliem,  almost  be- 
fore they  knew  well  what  they  were  about,  were  giv- 
ing up  the  best  years  of  their  life  and  the  first  fruits 
of  their  newly  acquired  scholarship  to  the  most  labo- 


THE  SACRIFICE  AND  TOE  WORK. 


39 


nous  drudgery  and  most  thankless  of  all  works, — 
Translations  of  the  Fatliei's.  They  had  to  give  long 
days  and  nights  for  long  periods  to  the  study  of  very 
indifferent  Greek  or  Latin,  —  the  matter  itself  often 
below  the  level  of  the  language  ;  and  they  had  to 
produce  an  English  rendering  in  which  grace,  elo- 
quence, dignity,  indeed  style  of  any  kind,  was  out  of 
the\iuestion. 

It  is  not  too  mucli  to  say  that  few  of  these  transla- 
tions are  readable.  Indeed,  if  anj^body  wishes  to  read 
the  "Fathers,"  he  will  find  it  much  the  better  course 
to  master  the  difficulty  of  the  language  and  read  the 
original,  instead  of  laboring  through  a  translation 
Avhich  is  neither  English  nor  Greek.  Yet  nothing 
else  could  be  attempted,  for  exact,  not  to  say  literal 
fidelity  is  the  first  rule  of  translation  when  the  sub- 
ject is  Christian  truth  and  morality.  Some  of  these 
men  had  to  write  articles  on  subjects  they  knew  or 
cared  little  about ;  to  learn  as  they  went  on,  and  per- 
haps to  know  just  so  much  at  the  end  as  to  repent  of 
having  ever  begun. 

But  besides  those  who  enrolled  themselves  as  work- 
ers and  placed  themselves  under  orders,  there  was  a 
rapidly  increasing  crowd  of  other  men  who  would  do 
the  like,  if  not  the  same.  If  a  man  is  sufiiciently 
confident  of  his  own  powers,  he  will  naturally  rather 
publish  entirely  on  his  own  account  than  take  a  place 
in  a  series,  entailing  conditions  of  time  and  outward 
form,  besides  a  certain  share  of  the  general  responsi- 
bilit3\  So  editions  and  translations  of  the  Fathers 
were  announced  at  Oxford  and  Cambridge,  and  every- 
where. 

The  old  editions  of  the  Fathers  and  great  divines 
that  had  long  been  the  lumber  of  old  libraries  and 


40 


/ 

REMINISCEXCES. 


second-hand  book  shops,  folios  that  had  been  almost 
on  their  way  to  the  grocers,  or  to  the  pulp-vat,  the 
survivors  of  many  that  had  gone  that  way,  were  now 
quoted  in  the  market  with  rising  prices.  Intending 
purchasers  went  to  the  great  booksellers'  and  the  auc- 
tion rooms,  and  found  themselves  outbid  by  agents 
from  the  United  States.  What  had  been  waste 
paper  a  year  or  two  before  was  now  waited  for  with 
longing  eyes  across  the  Atlantic.  To  this  day  pos- 
sessors will  sometimes  find,  not  quite  rubbed  oat,  7s. 
GtZ.,  and  in  its  place  five  guineas. 

The  effect  on  the  immense  outer  world  corresponded 
to  the  intensity  of  the  action  in  the  inner  circle,  but 
in  more  material  form.  The  greater  part  of  mankind 
will  accept  most  readily  that  which  addi'esses  itself  to 
the  senses,  to  the  ear  and  to  the  eye.  It  is  not  easy 
to  maintain  a  life  of  perpetual  devotion,  or  even  to 
make  true  charity  the  rule  of  one's  social  habits. 
It  is  comparatively  easy  to  build  or  restore  churches, 
to  adorn  them,  to  have  new  services  with  an  ornate 
ritual,  to  establish  choirs,  and  set  up  new  organs. 
There  is  much  that  is  religious  and  even  salutary, 
even  though  it  does  not  go  to  the  very  root  of  one's 
nature,  and  has  to  be  followed  up,  or  be  nothing  at 
all.  The  truth  is,  people  do  just  what  they  can  do, 
and  with  most  people  simple  piety  is  a  labor,  and  not 
of  love.  They  crowd  round  the  threshold  and  re- 
main there  long.  Slow  as  they  are  to  enter,  it  is  hard 
to  drive  them  away  with  the  old  Pagan  ban,  Proeul, 
procul  este  profani.  At  least  the  Church  of  England 
cannot  and  will  not  do  it. 

The  publications  of  these  men,  in  whatever  rank  or 
degree  attached  to  the  cause,  whether  movers,  orig- 
inal writers,  translators ;  whether  organized,  or  tak 


THE  SACBIFICE  AND  THE  WORK, 


41 


ing  their  own  lines,  amount  to  an  enormous  mass  of 
literature,  sufficient  to  tax  students  in  time  to  come. 
Strange  to  say,  the  fault  most  commonly  found  with 
it  is  its  deficiencies.  So  many  other  things  ought  to 
have  been  done,  as  well  as  what  was  done. 

In  the  whole  mass  there  is  very  little  Biblical  criti- 
cism —  none,  it  has  been  said,  besides  Pusey's  "  Mi- 
nor Prophets  "  and  Keble's  metrical  version  of  the 
Psalms  —  or  social  philosophy ;  no  original  views  of 
duty,  and  not  much  to  meet  the  great  problems  of  the 
age,  though  a  good  deal  to  impede  their  solution. 
With  regai'd  to  absence  of  Biblical  criticism,  it  is  best 
to  state  the  facts  and  leave  them  to  themselves. 
There  was  hardly  such  a  thing  as  Biblical  criticism  in 
this  country  at  the  beginning  of  this  century.  Poole's 
Synopsis  contained  all  that  an  ordinary  clergyman 
could  wish  to  know.  Arnold  is  described  as  in  all  his 
glory  at  Rugby,  with  Poole's  Synopsis  on  one  side, 
and  Facciolati  on  the  other.  He  knew  the  value  of 
the  book  ;  but  at  that  very  time,  if  a  country  clergy- 
man chanced  to  find  that  he  had  two  copies  of  the 
work,  and  that  therefore  he  had  one  to  spare,  he  would 
liave  found  it  difficult  to  obtain  five  shillings  for  the 
five  volumes. 

Mr.  T.  Hartwell  Horne  published  his  "  Introduc- 
tion "  to  the  Critical  Study  of  the  Scriptures  in  the 
year  1818,  and  in  the  second  edition,  published  three 
years  after,  he  says  he  had  undertaken  the  work  be- 
cause he  had  found  the  want  of  it ;  and  that  as  soon 
as  he  set  about  it  he  found  that  he  had  to  depend  en- 
tirely on  foreign  Biblical  critics,  and  that  had  not  a 
good  list  of  them  accidentally  fallen  into  his  hands 
and  guided  his  researches,  he  never  could  have  done 
the  work.    He  did  it  well,  all  things  considered,  and 


42 


REMINISCENCES. 


by  the  date  of  the  Oxford  movement  he  had  brought 
out  several  more  editions. 

The  clerg)',  and  still  more  the  laity,  were  content  to 
be  helped.  They  did  not  care  to  go  into  that  vine- 
yard themselves,  when  tliey  could  get  what  they 
wanted  in  the  open  market  or  second-hand.  It  is  hard 
to  deny  that  they  were  right,  and  that  little  good 
could  possibly  have  been  done  by  setting  them  to 
work  on  the  sacred  text.  There  were  indeed  already 
earnest  and  reiterated  complaints  tliat  while  we  had 
an  Authorized  Version,  we  had  not  a  Textus  Recep- 
tus,  and  that  it  was  notorious  the  Greek  basis  of  our 
version  had  been  fixed  on  imperfect  data,  which  could 
now  be  largely  supplemented.  But  the  critics  failed 
to  insjjire  interest  in  their  subject.  Be  the  cause  or 
the  movement  good  or  bad,  it  would  not  have  been  at 
all,  but  would  have  fallen  still-born  to  the  ground,  had 
it  gone  into  such  questions  as  those  wliich  have  very 
usefully  occupied  the  attention  of  the  Revision  com- 
panies. 

The  truth  is,  movements  are  always  made  in  one 
direction,  and  it  is  idle  to  complain  that  they  are  not 
made  in  all  directions  at  the  same  time.  Certainly 
Newman  was  better  emploj'ed  than  in  collating  texts, 
and  thi'owing  upon  obscure  passages  and  brief  notices 
the  light  of  historical  or  topographical  discoveries. 
He  could  do  other  t'lings  very  much  better.  Very 
recently,  upon  an  appeal  being  made  to  him  by  the 
"  Revision  editor,"  of  a  periodical,  he  replied  that 
"  he  had  never  made  the  text  of  the  New  Testament 
his  special  study."  No  doubt  he  would  as  soon  have 
sat  down  to  dissect  a  human  body  as  pull  that  text 
to  pieces. 

Upon  the  whole  the  movement  must  be  credited 


THE  SACRIFICE  AND  THE  WORK. 


43 


with  the  increased  interest  in  divine  things,  the  more 
reverential  regard  for  sacred  persons  and  places,  and 
the  freedom  from  mere  traditional  interpretation, 
which  mark  the  present  century  in  comparison  with 
the  last.  The  Oxford  movement,  unforeseen  b}'  the 
chief  movers,  and  to  some  extent  in  spite  of  them, 
has  produced  a  generation  of  ecclesiologists,  ritualists, 
and  religious  poets.  Whatever  may  be  said  of  its 
priestcraft,  it  has  filled  the  land  with  clmrcii  crafts  of 
all  kinds.  Has  it  not  had  some  share  in  the  restora- 
tion of  Biblical  criticism  and  in  the  Revision  of  the 
Authorized  Version  ? 


CHAPTER  LXXVI. 


MARIA  GIBERNE. 

In  all  this  goodly  arraj^  there  was  not  a  grander  or 
more  ornamental  figure  than  ]\^aria  Rosina  Giberne. 
She  was,  nay  she  is,  the  prima  donna  of  the  company. 
Tall,  strong  of  build,  majestic,  with  aquiline  nose, 
well-formed  mouth,  dark  penetrating  eyes,  and  a 
luxuriance  of  glossy  black  hair,  she  would  command 
attention  anywliere.  Like  so  many  others  about  us, 
she  was  of  old  French  Protestant  stock,  and  she  had 
inherited  that  faith.  She  was  very  early  the  warmest 
and  the  most  appi'eciative  of  Newman's  admirers, 
even  in  his  Scott  and  Newton  days,  before  even  his 
Oriel  days  I  believe. 

She  was  always  a  most  excellent  talker  and  nar- 
rator, but  her  great  power  lay  in  the  portraits  she 
did  in  chalks.  At  a  very  short  sitting,  and  even  from 
memor}'^,  she  would  draw  a  portrait  which  was  at 
least  perfectly  and  undeniably  true.  I  have  heard 
her  drawings  criticised,  and  her  drapery  called  con- 
ventional, but  her  faces,  to  my  apprehension,  were 
proof  against  all  criticism.  Perhaps  they  are  better 
in  .outline  then  when  filled  up  and  tinted.  Besides 
many  porti'aits  of  Newman  himself  at  various  periods, 
she  did  a  most  interesting  group  of  the  Newman 
family  in  1829,  the  Rickards,  and  many  others.  On 
a  visit  at  old  Mr.  Wilberforce's  she  drew  a  portrait 
of  him,  following  a  published  engi'aving,  but  using 
her  own  eyes  too. 


MARIA  GIBERNE. 


45 


Her  interest  in  the  whole  circle  was  insatiable,- 
and  there  was  hardly  anything  she  would  not  do  and 
dare  for  a  siglit  of  one  she  had  not  yet  seen.  With 
some  other  ladies  she  was  at  a  breakfast  in  Oriel 
common  room.  I  caught  a  sight  of  Keble  crossing  a 
corner  of  the  Quad,  and  unwisely  proclaimed  the  fact. 
Instantly  the  table  was  deserted  and  the  windows 
manned,  if  I  may  so  say,  with  fair  faces.  They  were 
just  in  time  to  see  the  poet's  back  as  he  disappeared 
into  the  other  Quad.  I  exclaimed  in  vain  at  the  im- 
propriety of  the  movement.  But  Keble  was  a  very 
shy  bird,  often  heard  of,  little  seen. 

One  who  had  loved  Maria  Giberne,  either  in  vain 
or  without  the  courage  to  declare  himself,  died  in 
India,  and  left  her  all  he  had,  which  made  her  com- 
paratively independent.  She  joined  the  Roman  com- 
munion about  the  same  time  Newman  did.  An  em- 
ployment was  immediately  found  for  her  very  much 
to  her  taste.  She  went  to  Rome,  and  had  the  use  of 
a  room  in  tlie  gallery  of  the  Palazzo  Borghese.  There 
she  worked  incessantly  for  near  twenty  years,  copy- 
ing and  adapting  the  pictures  for  use  in  English 
chapels.  How  she  succeeded  I  know  not,  but  having 
always  worked  in  chalks,  she  must  have  found  herself 
a  novice  in  oils.  She  gave  her  own  labor,  but  had 
to  ask  something  for  the  canvas  and  painting  ma- 
terials, including  the  gold  lavishly  laid  on  the  back- 
ground of  some  of  the  pictures. 

Her  apartments  were  at  the  top  of  a  house  be- 
tween the  Quirinal  and  the  Forum  of  Trajan.  She 
was  in  her  very  stately  studio,  near  the  Ripetta,  at 
ten  every  morning,  and  tliere  she  worked  till  four; 
coming  and  returning  by  the  steps  of  the  Trinita  de' 
Monti,  and  the  Quirinal,  all  of  it  high  ground,  and 


46 


EEMINISCENCES. 


yerj  quiet.  She  never  bad  any  molestation,  or  ad- 
venture, or  illness.  As  for  the  former  exemption  one 
could  understand  it.  She  moved  along  like  a  divinity. 
I  met  her  one  day  in  the  streets.  While  we  were 
talking.  Dr.  Gason,  the  well-known  physician,  came 
up,  and  Maria  Giberne  passed  on.  "  Do  pray  tell 
me,"  he  said,  "  who  that  lady  is,  for  I  have  seen  her 
hundreds  of  times,  and  never  could  learn.  She  is  the 
handsomest  woman  I  ever  saw  in  my  life."  She  was 
then  about  fifty.  Her  unfailing  health  she  ascribed 
to  her  observance  of  the  fasts,  and  her  general  ab- 
stemiousness. Her  diet  consisted  chiefly  of  bread 
and  fruit,  mostly  apples.  One  apple  in  the  middle 
of  a  long  day  she  spoke  of  as  a  great  refreshment. 
She  had  never  to  complain  of  the  heat. 

A  fortnight  every  year  she  spent  with  the  Borghese 
family  at  their  villa  in  the  country,  and  there  she  met 
great  people.  Here  she  had  sketched  Pio  Nono  on 
a  mule ;  and  Antonelli  had  sat  to  her.  Just  to 
quicken  him  up,  she  opened  a  pleasant  conversation. 
"  So  you  are  to  be  the  next  Pope?  If  not  you,  who 
will  it  be  ?  What  do  you  think  of  the  state  of 
things  ?  "  The  Cardinal  was  on  his  guard,  but  very 
pleasant. 

She  had  made  some  poor  acquaintances ;  one  of 
them  was  a  black-ej-ed,  thin  little  woman  who  had 
fourteen  children,  and  had  been  so  fortunate  as  to 
rear  half  a  dozen  of  them,  the  rest  having  died  of 
hunger.  One  of  the  boys,  about  eleven  or  twelve, 
Maria  Giberne  had  taken  into  her  service,  and  trained 
as  a  page.  She  asked  us  to  an  evening  entertain- 
ment, and  we  were  to  meet  some  English  students 
from  the  Collegio  Pio.  When  the  outer  door  opened, 
an  interesting,  black-eyed  skeleton  stood  before  us, 


MARIA  GIBERNE. 


47 


and  demanded  oar  names.  There  were  five  of  us  ; 
including  three  patronymics,  of  which  two  would 
present  difficulties  to  most  foreign  ears  and  tongues. 
I  was  considering  whether  it  would  be  possible  to 
charge  the  lad  with  such  a  burden,  when  he  repeated 
the  demand,  tliis  time  in  Roman  fashion,  peremptorily. 
I  had  to  obey,  but  I  was  curious  to  see  what  work 
be  would  make  of  it.  To  my  surprise,  on  opening 
the  inner  door,  he  announced  us  all  with  perfect 
accuracy,  including  two  Christian  names,  without  a 
syllable  or  a  letter  wrong.  His  mistress  had  spent 
some  time  in  the  morning  teaching  him  to  recite  all 
the  expected  names,  till  he  had  done  it  perfectl}'. 

There  were  four  visitors  from  the  college,  one  of 
them  a  man  whose  name  had  been  familiar  to  me  for 
many  years,  with  associations  that  had  made  me  wish 
much  to  see  him,  and  even  wonder  why  I  never  did. 
This  was  Mr.  Laprimaudaye.  The  name  itself  is 
not  one  to  be  forgotten.  I  had  imagined  him  young 
and  handsome.  He  was  still  handsome,  but  in 
years  very  grey,  and  a  tall,  gracious,  fatherly  figure. 
The  young  ladies  with  me  pronounced  him  by  far 
the  pleasantest  man  of  the  party.  When  I  had  a 
chance  I  talked  over  old  times  and  common  acquaint- 
ances with  him,  but  said  to  myself  I  must  manage 
to  see  more  of  him.  We  parted  with  some  ex- 
pressions to  that  efi'ect.  He  was  taken  ill  the  next 
day,  and  died  a  week  after.  I  was  to  see  him,  and 
this  was  my  very  last  chance. 

When  the  page  came  in  with  his  tray,  we  were  all 
talking  of  what  we  had  been  seeing  and  hearing. 
This  was  on  tme  of  the  days  between  Christmas  and 
Epiphany,  and  we  mentioned  having  been  to  the 
Ara  Couli  Church  to  hear  the  children,  of  all  classes, 


48 


BEMIXISCEXCES. 


delivering  their  little  sermons  from  a  miniature  pulpit 
bung  with  blue  satin.  The  church  is  that  in  -which 
Gibbon  conceived  the  idea  of  his  great  work.  It 
stands  at  the  top  of  the  immense  flight  of  marble 
steps,  up  which  Julius  Cicsar  crawled  on  his  hands 
and  knees  to  thank  Jupiter  for  his  conquest  of  the 
world.  We  noticed  that  most  of  the  very  juvenile, 
not  to  say  infantine,  preachers  showed  marvellous 
courage,  fluency,  and  grace.  But  there  had  been 
one  failure.  A  pretty  little  fellow  of  six,  or  less,  had 
burst  into  tears  and  retreated  to  his  mother's  arms. 

We  were  immediately  told  that  the  page  had  de- 
livered a  sermon  the  day  before,  duly  instructed  by 
his  mistress.  "  You  shall  hear  it,"  she  said.  "  Put 
down  the  tray,"  she  added,  turning  to  the  page, 
"and  preach  your  sermon."  He  laid  down  his  tray 
on  the  ground,  if  I  remember  right,  took  his  position 
in  the  middle  of  the  room,  put  himself  into  a  graceful 
attitude,  assumed  an  earnest  expression,  and  delivered 
with  great  energy  what  I  thought  must  be  a  poem, 
but  it  was  a  sermon,  which  I  was  sorry  not  to  be 
able  to  follow.  The  sermon  ended  he  resumed  the 
tray,  and  impressively  urged  its  contents  upon  our 
notice.  We  talked  over  the  antiquities  and  the 
galleries,  but  Maria  Giberne  had  almost  entirely 
ceased  to  recognize  anything  in  art  that  was  not 
Christian. 

At  the  Achilli  trial  there  was  occasional  mention 
of  one  Rosina  Giuberti,  who  had  shepherded  a  flock 
of  female  witnesses  from  Italy,  and  who  now  had 
charge  of  them  in  London.    This  was  our  friend. 

She  became  a  nun,  and  at  the  time  of  the  Franco- 
German  war  was  in  a  nunnerj-  at  Autun,  when 
Garibaldi  came,  and  turned  the  nuns  out  into  the 


MARIA  GIBEENE. 


49 


streets  to  make  way  for  his  rough  levies.  She  is 
still  in  a  nunnery,  but  occasionally  using  the  pencil 
and  the  brush.  She  cannot  be  far  from  eight}'^,  and 
I  am  told  that  she  still  has  the  same  flowing  locks, 
but  that  they  are  white  as  snow.  Her  talk  and  her 
letters,  they  say,  are  as  bright  as  ever.  Maria  Giberne 
sent  me  what  for  her  was  a  large  sum,  towards  the 
building  of  Cholderton  church.  As  they  say  in 
Ireland,  "  May  it  meet  her  in  heaven  !  " 

VOL.  II.  4 


CHAPTER  LXXVII. 


ARNOLD. 

The  question  has  been  so  frequently  asked,  kindly 
or  otherwise,  when  and  how,  and  from  what  motives 
and  with  what  ends,  Newman  began  to  stir  in  the 
direction  finally  taken,  that  the  reader  may  have  to 
excuse  an  occasional  recurrence  to  it  as  recollections 
bring  it  up.  The  ideas  of  Nemesis  and  reaction  were 
deep  in  Newman's  mind,  and  indeed  in  his  whole 
nature.  With  him  neither  person,  nor  rightful  cause, 
nor  just  complaint,  ever  died.  Even  when  most  in- 
dignant at  what  he  conceived  to  be  the  insults  offered 
to  the  Church  of  England  by  the  triumphant  Liberals, 
then  assisted  by  the  Irish  Catholics,  he  would  say 
every  now  and  then  that  he  feared  the  blood  of  the 
monks  and  nuns  turned  out  of  the  religious  houses  at 
the  Reformation  to  perish  in  prisons,  or  out  of  doors, 
was  crying  from  the  ground. 

Always  waiting  for  indication,  whatever  happened, 
for  good  or  for  ill,  he  acted  upon  it.  It  was  a  provi- 
dential stepping-stone  in  a  field  of  uncertainties.  No 
doubt  people  may  deceive  themselves  by  this  sort  of 
reckoning,  and  many  have  so  deceived  themselves. 
But  no  observer  could  fail  to  see  that  whatever  New- 
man did,  it  was  a  I'eaction  upon  that  whicli  had  been 
done  to  him.  People  in  general  might  not  pei'ceive 
it,  for,  in  truth,  there  is  no  matter  upon  which  people 
in  general  are  so  blind,  and  even  stupid,  as  the  force 


ARNOLD. 


51 


of  inevitable  reactions.  They  do  what  they  please, 
what  squares  with  tlieir  own  views,  or  gratifies  their 
own  feelings,  and  then  fondly  imagine  they  have 
settled  a  question,  and  disposed  finally  of  some  annoy- 
ance, unless  it  be  a  small  unsettled  remainder  which 
time  will  settle  for  them.  They  are  not  aware  that 
every  one-sided  settlement  is  only  the  opening  of  a 
new  account,  which  they,  of  all  the  world,  are  most 
concerned  to  keep  their  eyes  upon. 

To  Newman  life  was  a  game,  serious  indeed,  but 
still  a  game,  in  which  move  must  be  met  by  move, 
and  check-mate  never  acknowledged  so  long  as  a 
move  was  possible.  For  everything  he  did  there  was 
this  foundation  in  circumstance,  and  the  secret  of  his 
career  cannot  be  discovered,  if  it  is  to  be  discovered, 
without  taking  into  account  everything  that  happened 
about  him. 

For  at  least  the  first  nine  years  of  his  Oriel  life 
those  most  about  him  may  now  in  vain  rack  tlieir 
memories  for  anything  he  said  or  did  to  indicate  a 
movement  in  any  direction  whatever,  except  that 
vaguely  indicated  by  a  return  to  primitive  Chris- 
tianity. This  is  vague  in  the  same  sense  that  the 
Evangelical  movement  is  vague,  for  Apostolicals  and 
Evangelicals  must  be  equally  at  a  loss  to  say  exactly 
what  it  is  they  want  to  bring  back  again,  or  turn  us 
all  round  to. 

Newman  used  indeed  to  say  that  a  man  need  not 
make  up  his  mind  till  he  was  thirty,  but  that  he 
ought  then.  As  to  this  making  up  of  one's  mind, 
and  this  set  course  to  be  persistently  and  consistently 
run,  it  was  one  of  the  favorite  ideas  of  that  epoch. 
Not  to  speak  of  the  ordinary  religious  books,  Foster's 
essays  on  "  Decision  of  Character "  was  then  upon 


52 


BEMmSCEXCES. 


every  table,  and  no  youth  of  the  least  promise  could 
go  anj^-where  without  being  set  upon  by  good  ladies, 
urging  him  instantly  to  select  one  grand  object,  and 
stick  to  it  through  life,  whatever  the  difficulties. 

Arnold  is  often  quoted  as  having  contributed  to 
the  impulses  and  even  to  the  principles  resulting  in 
the  Oxford  movement.  His  pupils  are  too  dazzled  by 
the  lustre  of  his  bright  and  glowing  image  in  their 
recollections  to  see  what  was  anterior  to  him,  and 
they  are  too  bewitched  by  their  love  to  think  any- 
body not  indebted  to  him.  But  the  truth  is  Newman 
could  hardly  have  met,  or  even  seen,  Arnold  half  a 
dozen  times  in  his  life  when  the  latter,  not  long  be- 
fore his  early  death,  came  to  Oxford  to  deliver  his 
lectures  as  Professor  of  Ancient  History.  Arnold, 
indeed,  was  always  well  represented  at  Oxford,  first 
by  his  contemporaries,  then  by  his  pupUs  as  they 
came  up  one  after  another.  Bonamy  Price  led  the 
column,  and  for  four  years,  from  1825  to  1829,  he 
sounded  his  tutor's  praises,  and  his  tutor's  sayings,  in 
every  college,  and  almost  every  room  in  the  Univer- 
sity. All  who  remember  that  period  must  still  be 
glad  to  recall  the  oracular  solemnity  with  which  he 
pronounced  the  name  of  the  great  man  as  the  author 
of  some  grand  enunciation  or  very  decided  opinion. 
These  utterances  had  been  mostly  political,  or  what 
in  these  days  are  called  social.  Had  I  memory,  or 
had  I  kept  a  journal,  I  should  now  be  able  to  repro- 
duce hundreds  of  them.  They  might  be  only  what 
everybody  knew  or  thought,  but  Arnold  had  made 
them  his  own  by  his  vigor  and  terseness  of  expression. 
What  I  remember  most  is  a  prophecy  that  labor  and 
capital  would  before  long  be  in  collision,  and  that 
the  struggle  would  be  severe  and  the  issue  doubtful. 


ARNOLD. 


53 


Having  myself  lived  some  years  in  a  manufacturing 
town,  I  was  sufficiently  aware  of  the  collision  and  the 
struggle,  but  what  I  seemed  to  learn  from  Arnold 
■was  that  labor  would  meet  with  unexpected  reinforce- 
ment from  the  philosopher,  the  philanthropist,  and 
the  statesman.  Amongst  these  utterances  there  was 
little  or  nothing  to  bear  on  the  coming  movement,  of 
which  Arnold's  own  college  was  to  be  birthplace, 
and  for  which  the  event  showed  him  to  be  utterly 
unprepared. 

Arnold's  pamphlet  on  "  Church  Reform  "  was  part 
of  the  vast  pile  that  awaited  Newman's  return  from 
the  Mediterranean  in  1833.  His  volume  of  "  Rugby 
Sermons  "  had  not  been  received  favorably  by  New- 
man and  his  friends,  not  so  much  on  account  of  the 
Sermons  themselves,  as  on  account  of  a  note  on 
Genesis  xxii.,  in  which  Arnold  laid  down  that  the 
Almighty  could  not  do  an  immoral  thing,  and  that 
consequently  if  we  thought  anything  wrong  we  were 
bound  to  believe  that  He  had  not  done  it.  This  of 
course  struck  at  every  miracle,  and  every  extraordi- 
nary act  for  which  is  claimed  a  preternatural  sanction, 
if  in  any  respect  whatever  it  does  not  accord  with  our 
most  sentimental,  or  our  most  abstract,  notions  of 
morality.  Rightly  or  wrongly,  the  note  was  fully 
believed  at  Oxford  to  have  been  written  with  this 
comprehensive  and  destructive  design. 

It  would,  however,  be  contrary  to  the  whole  theory 
of  Newman's  life  to  suppose  that  Arnold  had  no  share 
in  it.  What  then  was  that  share  ?  This  was  Arnold's 
intense  energy  of  character  ;  his  deep  sense  of  a  calling 
which  he  had  to  obey,  and  of  a  work  which  he  had  to 
do.  As  Arnold's  own  turn  was  to  speculation  and 
scepticism,  he  had  but  scant  practical  aim.  The 


54 


EEMINISCENCES. 


result  was  that  his  extraordinary  impulsive,  not  to 
say  explosive,  power  sent  his  men  in  all  directions, 
and  while  the  explosion  itself  was  a  contribution  to 
the  original  springs  of  the  Oxford  movement,  the  dif- 
ferent results  of  that  explosion  variously  affected  its 
form. 

Arnold,  it  is  to  be  observed,  could  only  have  had 
the  slightest  personal  knowledge  of  Newman,  or  of 
his  friends  ;  and  he  had  not  even  the  opportunity  of 
supplementing  this  want  by  information  through 
common  and  impartial  acquaintances.  While  there 
was  a  regular  stream  of  informants  setting  in  from 
Rugby  to  Oxford,  there  was  no  such  stream  from 
Oxford  to  Rngby,  unless  it  were  some  undercurrent 
of  a  tlioroughly  prejudiced  character.  Whether  as 
private  tutor,  or  as  head-master  of  Rugby,  Arnold 
was  engaged  in  the  most  laborious  and  engrossing  of 
all  occupations,  seeking  occasional  relief  from  that 
drudgery  by  inquiries  into  the  most  conjectural  re- 
gions of  history,  or  into  the  political  or  religious  prob- 
lems of  the  future.  He  thus  lived  in  a  world  of  his 
own,  as  despotic  at  his  writing-desk  as  in  his  school, 
and  wielding  his  pen  as  if  it  were  a  ferule. 

At  the  very  time  when  he  was  expressing  himself 
with  his  constitutional  warmth  and  decision  about 
Newman  and  his  colleagues  in  the  movement,  he  was 
ignorant,  worse  than  ignorant,  of  their  character  and 
their  cause.  Better  had  he  never  heard  of  them  than 
acquired  so  ridiculous  a  misconception.  What  else, 
however,  could  be  expected  from  a  man  who  in  1832 
published  in  successive  pamphlets  liis  full  belief  that 
the  House  of  Commons  could  easily  and  quickly  so 
modify  the  Prayer  Book  that  all  English  churches, 
sects,  and  denominations  would  be  found  shaking 


ARNOLD. 


55 


hands  in  the  closest  brotherhood  and  accord  before 
the  end  of  ten  years  ? 

Arnold,  like  many  other  good  and  great  people, 
had  a  temper  of  his  own,  and  rather  a  warm  one,  for 
he  was  warm  all  over  it  may  be  said.  But  from  the 
year  1832  he  was,  in  a  certain  sense,  a  disappointed 
man.  His  Church  Reform,  and  all  the  other  Church 
reforms,  had  been  fired  off  in  vain,  for  neither  the 
Church,  nor  the  dissenters,  nor  the  vast  mass  who 
Avere  neither,  were  ready  to  accept  the  tlieory  that  the 
Church  was  the  people,  and  the  people  the  Cliurch, 
and  that  whatever  the  people  at  large  wanted  must 
be  tlie  rule  and  the  creed  of  tlie  Church.  His  pe- 
culiar regime  at  Rugby  School,  which  involved  fre- 
quent expulsions,  must  have  helped  to  fret  liis  natural 
tenderness. 

He  was  also  undergoing  some  rather  rough  local 
baiting.  Litchfield,  a  well-known  Tory  clergyman, 
and  a  recognized  chief  of  the  party  in  the  Midlands, 
devoted  himself  to  the  confjenial  task  of  satirizino: 
the  head-master  of  Rugby  at  any  available  public 
or  festive  occasion  in  the  town  and  neighborhood. 
Arnold  could  have  well  afforded  to  smile  at  such 
attacks,  but  he  did  not.  On  the  contrary,  his  imag- 
ination peopled  the  world  with  Litchfields,  and  he 
could  not  hear  of  the  slightest  contravention  of  his 
opinions  without  imagining  some  animal  of  the  same 
lively  species  about  to  spring  on  him.  He  seemed  to 
live  in  a  jangle,  where  every  moving  of  the  reeds  was 
fearfully  significant. 

Newman's  friends  had  accepted  the  character  of 
Arnold  as  an  amiable  enthusiast,  drawn  in  by  Bun- 
sen,  the  busy  vortex  of  a  wide  and  absorbing  enthu- 
siasm, but  still  true  to  his  professions  of  dove-like 


56 


REMINISCENCES. 


sweetness  and  simplicity.  They  were  astonished  be- 
yond measure  when  Arnold's  own  friends  proclaimed 
with  confidence,  and  as  they  felt  with  just  pride,  that 
he  was  the  writer  of  the  article  on  the  Oxford  Malig- 
nants.  It  expressed  more  the  indignation  of  a  man 
disappointed  of  a  mighty  ambition,  than  the  generous 
impulses  of  a  still  hopeful  reformer.  But  which  was 
the  true  Arnold,  the  writer  of  the  pamphlets  and  of 
the  sermons,  or  the  writer  of  the  article  ?  Was  it  the 
dove  assuming  for  the  hour  the  sombre  plumage  and 
shrill  screams  of  the  hawk,  or  the  bird  of  prey  that 
as  often  as  it  found  convenient,  could  glisten  in  the 
sun  and  coo  like  a  dove. 

It  is  too  true,  however,  that  very  good  gentlemen 
will  sometimes  denude  themselves  of  their  Christian 
livery  when  they  enter  the  anonymous  arena.  Strange 
to  say,  the  more  good  people  abuse  the  pi-ess,  the 
worse  do  they  behave  when  they  find  themselves 
taking  a  part  in  it. 

Some  years  after,  from  one  cause  or  another,  there 
was  a  great  softening  in  Arnold,  and  when  he  came 
up  for  his  lectures  on  ancient  history,  and  was  thrown 
into  Newman's  company  at  Oriel,  they  became  good 
friends,  and  so  parted. 


CHAPTER  LXXVIII. 


JOSEPH  DOENFORD. 

Any  account  of  Oriel  at  that  period  would  be  very- 
defective  indeed,  if  it  failed  to  notice  a  man  who  held 
his  place  in  the  college  for  many  years,  though  sin- 
gularly out  of  place  there.  Joseph  Dornford  was 
the  son  of  a  well-known  Cambridge  lady,  who,  after 
becoming  the  mother  of  Mr.  Thomason,  and  losing 
her  husband,  married  again,  and  became  the  mother 
of  Joseph  Dornford,  and  of  his  sister,  the  wife  of 
Archdeacon  Robinson.  Mrs.  Dornford  was  Simeon's 
chief  lady  friend,  and  poured  out  the  tea  for  his 
weekly  gatherings. 

Dornford  must  have  been  a  very  engaging  child. 
His  lithe,  upright  figure,  his  sprightly  action,  and  his 
ever  ready  tongue,  combined  with  that  self-possession 
and  self-consciousness  so  often  wanting  in  early  years, 
promised  great  things  from  him.  At  his  private 
tutor's  he  had  Macaulay  for  a  fellow  pupil,  a  lank, 
shy,  awkward,  pale-faced  boy,  he  said,  with  whom  he 
could  not  get  on.  He  entered  young  at  Trinity,  and 
distinguished  himself. 

Suddenly,  however,  in  1811,  he  enlisted  into  the 
Rifle  Brigade  and  went  to  the  Peninsula.  Various 
were  the  accounts  given  of  this  extraordinary  step. 
He  had  been  disappointed  of  a  scholarship  ;  or  of  a 
pretty  girl.  He  had  read  in  the  papers  a  dreadful 
story  of  an  outrage  by  French  soldiers,  and  he  burned 


58 


REMINISCENCES. 


to  avenge  it.  Upon  seeing  a  long  list  of  killed  and 
wounded,  he  felt  it  shameful  for  a  strong  man  to  stay 
at  home.  The  strains  of  a  recruiting  band  had 
smitten  him  Avith  martial  ardor,  and  he  had  at  once 
ruslied  out  and  fallen  in.  But  no  one  who  knew 
Dornford  had  to  go  far  for  a  reason.  He  would 
ratber  fly  to  the  ends  of  the  earth  and  seek  the  com- 
pany of  cannibals  or  wild  beasts  than  be  bound  to  a 
life  of  tea  and  twaddle. 

So  he  went  to  the  war,  as  a  rifleman  attached  to 
a  regiment,  with  the  promise  of  a  commission  in  two 
years,  if  he  was  found  qualified  for  it.  He  imme- 
diately became  the  pet  of  his  mess.  He  could  not 
be  more  than  seventeen  ;  he  could  tell  any  number 
of  stories,  and  recite  Scott's  poetry  by  pages.  Of 
course  they  called  him  "  Marmion."  But  he  had  very 
hard  work,  coming  in  for  several  battles  and  some 
tremendous  forced  marches. 

On  one  occasion  his  division  had  to  retrace  in  one 
day  three  days'  marches  under  a  burning  sun,  and 
finishing  with  a  steep  ascent,  which  left  many  dying 
and  even  dead  on  the  roadside.  There  were  men 
who  pressed  halfway  up  the  hill,  in  order  to  reach  a 
well-known  spring  and  take  water  down  to  their 
perishing  comrades ;  and  other  men  relieving  their 
comrades  of  their  heavy  firearms. 

He  left  the  army  just  when  the  worst  was  over, 
and  returned  home,  crossing  the  commission  going 
out  for  him.  Some  said  he  felt  his  services  were  no 
longer  required,  inasmuch  as  the  French  were  in  full 
retreat  on  the  Pyrenees.  Others  said  that,  being  told 
out  for  a  "  forlorn  hope,"  he  found  himself  so  ill  that 
he  had  to  ajjply  for  sick  leave.  Henry  Wilberforce 
used  to  observe  on  this,  "  I  am  sure  that  if  I  knevy  I 


JOSEPH  DORNFORD. 


59 


was  to  be  in  a  forlorn  hope  to-morrow,  I  should  be 
very  ill  indeed."  But  it  was  plain  his  fabric  and  con- 
stitution were  not  equal  to  such  work.  The  green  of 
his  jacket,  he  used  to  say,  had  run  into  his  white 
trousei's,  till  they  were  all  of  a  color.  He  was  never 
much  of  a  walker. 

However,  he  came  home,  entered  at  Oxford,  and 
became  a  member  of  Wadham,  to  the  society  of 
which  he  was  an  immense  acquisition.  They  had 
the  fresh  of  his  tales  of  war,  and  one  summer's  night, 
it  was  said,  he  induced  half  the  college  to  bivouac  in 
the  Quad.  His  tutor,  Benjamin  Symons,  fixed  upon 
his  impressible  memory  many  hundred  time-honored 
"construes,"  a  little  too  heavy,  some  people  said,  but 
all  the  better  for  Dornford,  who  perhaps  wanted 
weight.  They  made  his  fortune.  He  took  the 
highest  honors  at  Easter,  1816,  wlien  he  had  not 
been  four  years  home  from  the  Peninsula.  He  was 
elected  a  Michel  Fellow  of  Queen's,  and  thence  was 
elected  to  Oriel. 

But  before  lie  took  any  active  part  in  his  college, 
he  had  another  experience  almost  as  i"are  in  those 
days  as  his  Peninsular  episode.  He  had  felt  its 
abrupt  conclusion,  from  wliatever  cause,  a  slur  on 
his  military  reputation,  and  he  wished  to  place  his 
courage  beyond  a  doubt.  So  he  went  to  Chamounix, 
and  in  August,  1820,  attempted  an  ascent  of  Mont 
Blanc,  in  company  with  Dr.  Hamel,  a  Russian  gentle- 
man, well  known  as  an  astx'onomer,  and  in  several 
other  branches  of  science.  With  another  gentleman 
and  the  best  guides  the  valley  could  give,  it  was  a 
large  part}',  and  had  every  hope  of  success.  Dr. 
Hamel  published  a  narrative,  which  may  be  found 
very  fully  quoted  in  the  "  British  Critic,"  monthly 
series,  of  the  ensuing  November. 


60 


REMINISCENCES. 


It  would  seem  that  poor  Dornford  could  not  escape 
a  certain  line  of  destiny.  Passing  carefully  in  Indian 
file  across  a  slope  of  snow  only  a  few  hundred  yards 
below  the  summit,  Dornford,  who  had  been  near  the 
front,  stopped  for  a  minute  to  adjust  his  blue  veil, 
when  the  snow  slid  down  under  their  feet,  and  the 
three  guides,  then  in  front,  were  hurried  down  into  a 
crevasse,  never  to  appear  again  till  some  vestiges  were 
found  in  the  moraine,  many  miles  below,  forty  years 
after.  The  snow  only  came  to  a  stand  when  Dorn- 
ford was  on  the  very  edge  of  the  crevasse. 

The  surviving  guides  used  to  amuse  tourists  with 
a  story  of  Dornford's  excessive  agitation  ;  but  all 
that  they  could  say  positively  was  that  when  first 
seen  he  was  on  his  knees  thanking  Heaven  for  his 
preservation,  and  that  he  seemed  horrified  at  the 
thought  of  having  contributed  to  such  a  catastro- 
phe.  He  scarcely  ever  alluded  to  it,  for  he  felt  he 
had  tempted  Providence,  and  had  been  suitably  re- 
buked. 

When  Keble  gave  up  the  tutorship,  Dornford  took 
his  place.  Keble's  pupils  called  it  a  sad  let-down. 
Cei'tainly  you  no  longer  saw  befoi'e  you  one  of  the 
most  beautifully  formed  heads  in  the  world,  and  a 
pair  of  most  Avonderful  black  eyes  ;  and  you  no 
longer  had  diamonds  and  pearls  dropping  from  that 
mouth  whenever  it  opened.  Yet  they  who  came  after, 
as  I  did,  found  Dornford  a  good  lecturer,  up  to  his 
work,  ready,  precise,  and  incisive.  He  sometimes 
looked  disconcerted,  and  indeed  he  had  occasion  to 
look  so,  but  a  peculiar  compression  of  the  lips  was  all 
the  reprimand  he  ever  bestowed. 

Having  passed,  not  without  credit,  through  two 
universities  and  several  colleges,  and  having  also 


JOSEPH  DORNFORD. 


61 


graduated  in  the  great  school  of  honor  and  of  man- 
ners, as  all  must  allow  the  array  to  be,  Dornford  had 
a  high  and  peculiar  vocation,  and  he  was  conscious 
of  it.  Becoming  dean  of  the  college  and  of  the  com- 
mon room,  he  made  it  his  business  to  keep  up  the 
talk  and  the  tone  of  the  common  room.  As  what 
was  uppermost  came  out  first,  his  talk  ran  much  on 
war,  in  which  of  course  he  was  without  a  competitor 
at  Oxford. 

A  rival,  in  some  sort,  he  had  in  the  common  room 
man.  Norris  had  been  body  servant  to  the  Prince  of 
Orange  when  he  was  at  Oxfoi-d  under  the  care  of 
Dr.  Bull,  and  had  accompanied  him  when  he  joined 
the  Duke's  staff  in  the  Peninsula.  He  had  much  to 
say  of  the  operations.  He  had  carried  his  master  on 
his  back  across  a  rapid  river.  A  peculiar  twist  of 
his  knees,  and  an  uncertainty  in  his  gait,  were  be- 
lieved by  many  undergraduates  to  be  connected  with 
this  heroic  deed.  He  always  waited  at  the  Duke's 
table.  He  said  the  Duke  talked  about  anything  but 
the  fighting,  drank  a  couple  of  glasses  of  light  wine, 
and  left  the  table  almost  immediately  after  dinner. 

On  one  occasion,  Norris  said,  the  Duke  unex- 
pectedly ordered  a  movement  which  was  quite  un- 
accountable. It  resulted  in  the  loss  of  three  hundred 
mules  laden  with  tent  furniture,  crockery,  plate,  and 
wardrobes,  intercepted  by  the  enemy  before  they 
could  get  under  cover.  Norris  said  it  was  the  firm 
belief  of  the  officers  that  the  Duke  had  planned  the 
movement  for  this  very  purpose,  for  he  was  always 
grumbling  about  the  baggage  train.  But  the  officers 
did  not  take  it  kindly. 

Norris  had  a  capital  opportunity  for  telling  his 
stories.    Once  a  fortnight,  a  Probationer  had  to  go 


62 


REMINISCENCES, 


down  with  bim  into  the  cellar,  count  tho  bottles  of 
wine  taken  out,  and  enter  the  quantities  in  the  wine 
book.  Norris  kept  his  tongue  going.  The  Proba- 
tioner listened  with  avidity.  I  am  afraid  I  must  say 
that  I  never  counted  the  wine,  and  that  I  entei'ed  the 
quantities  at  Norris's  dictation,  which  it  did  not 
occur  to  me  was  hardly  the  check  contemplated. 

Dornford  took  much  interest  in  Napier's  "  History 
of  the  Peninsular  War,"  but  Blanco  White  was  for 
a  long  time  absorbed  by  it.  His  friends  noticed  with 
pleasure  the  happy  distraction. 

Upon  the  occasion  of  some  disturbances  arising 
out  of  the  inclosure  of  Otmoor,  a  company  of  soldiers 
was  quartered  at  Oxford,  said  to  be  the  first  time  for 
a  century.  Dornford  asked  the  officers,  half  a  dozen 
of  them,  to  dinner.  They  came  in  their  uniforms  and 
duly  accoutred.  Not  one  of  them  had  heard  a  shot 
fired  in  anger,  and  proud  was  Dornford  to  instruct 
them  in  the  fell  realities  of  their  profession. 

Wherever  he  was,  indoors  or  out  of  doors,  walking 
or  riding,  he  was  unmistakably  the  soldier.  Canter- 
ing, for  that  was  his  usual  pace,  on  a  long-legged 
horse,  with  his  martial  cloak  flying  from  his  shoulders, 
beggars,  the  veriest  strangers,  addressed  him  "■noble 
captain."  There  was  a  sort  of  defiance  in  his  air 
which  even  the  creatures  appeared  to  be  sensible  of. 
One  hot  summer's  day  a  swarm  of  bees  flew  at  him 
in  Nuneham  Courtney,  and  though  he  galloped  all 
the  way  to  Oxford  he  had  hardly  got  rid  of  them 
when  he  reached  Oriel. 

What  would  be  Dornford's  position,  and  duties, 
and  opportunities  as  a  private  in  the  Rifle  Brigade, 
passes  my  knowledge.  He  could  talk  of  the  war,  of 
the  movements  and  marches,  and  of  the  generals 
much  better  than  any  private  soldier  could  have  done, 


JOSEPH  DORNFORD. 


63 


or  indeed  than  most  subalterns  ;  but  of  his  own  par- 
ticular part  he  was  rather  reticent,  or  had  not  much 
to  say.  The  undergraduates,  however,  were  resolved 
that  he  must  have  exchanged  shots  near  enough  to 
be  of  some  purpose,  that  he  had  killed  his  man,  or 
any  number  of  men,  and  that  he  might  have  come  to 
close  quarters  now  and  then.  They  had  a  story,  for 
which  I  never  heard  the  authority,  that  he  was  once 
pressed  by  a  gay  young  partner  at  a  ball  to  say 
whether  he  had  killed  anybody.  If  the  story  be 
true,  it  must  have  been  ignorance,  or  more  probably 
insolence,  that  prompted  such  a  question.  Dornford, 
so  it  was  said,  replied  that  once  when  in  ambush 
he  saw  a  young  officer  galloping  across  the  open 
ground  a  long  way  off,  evidently  carrying  orders. 
He  was  bound  to  take  a  shot,  he  did,  and  felt  sure 
the  officer  quivered  in  his  saddle ;  but  as  he  was  im- 
mediately out  of  sight,  he  could  not  be  sure  that 
he  fell. 

Dornford  was  Proctoi",  and  made  a  handsome 
figure  in  the  velvet  sleeves.  In  anticipation  of  the 
office,  he  frequently  enlarged  on  the  tone  of  authority 
proper  to  it.  A  University  was  not  the  place  for 
military  discipline.  The  undergraduates  were  not 
privates,  they  were  cadets,  and  young  officers.  Much 
must  be  left  to  their  honor,  and  they  must  be  taken 
into  friendly  confidence.  With  these  excellent  ideas, 
and  with  a  manner  to  command  respect,  Dornford 
ought  to  have  attained  a  rare  success.  He  did  not 
entirely  succeed.  To  the  best  of  my  recollection  the 
only  popular  Proctors  were  those  who  did  nothing 
but  walk  about  in  their  handsome  fcowns,  lettin";  the 
undergraduates  do  what  they  pleased.  If  there  was 
the  '  xception  of  a  man  doing  his  duty  and  not  get- 
ting hated,  it  was  Longley. 


CHAPTER  LXXIX. 


DORNFOED  STILL  TUTOR. 

Undergraduates  have  a  perverse  way  of  looking 
at  things  the  wong  side,  and  they  called  Dovnford 
"  the  Corporal ;  "  indeed,  some  would  be  ready  to 
swear  that  he  had  been  actually  a  non-commissioned 
officer.  It  was  too  true  that  there  was  a  certain 
flourisli,  just  an  approach  to  bravado,  about  him, 
especially  when  there  was  gallantry  in  the  question, 
as  there  always  was  when  he  approached  a  woman  of 
any  description  whatever.  Young  or  old,  rich  or 
poor,  fine  lady  or  the  merest  peasant,  he  was  always 
the  gentleman  to  the  fair  sex.  Possibly  he  had  wit- 
nessed the  havoc  done  by  recruiting  sergeants  on  the 
hearts  of  barmaids,  and  thought  he  could  combine 
that  glory  with  perfect  innocency  and  high  culture. 
In  Spain,  too,  he  must  have  seen  some  rough  flirta- 
tion. Even  the  undergraduates  had  stories  of  his 
buckskins  and  his  gallivanting  which  were,  to  say  the 
least,  ridiculous.  His  ideal  of  matrimony  was  sub- 
lime. He  repeatedly  said  he  was  sure  there  was  only 
one  woman  in  the  world  he  could  marry,  and  he  had 
yet  to  make  her  acquaintance.  This  made  him  the 
more  daligerous,  for  if  women  could  but  overlook  a 
few  things,  he  was  a  very  striking  and  attractive 
person. 

Dornford's  later  college  life  was  not  happy. 
Though  obliged  to  take  the  Provost's  side,  he  really 


DORNFORD  STILL  TUTOR. 


65 


thought  the  contention  needless.  It  was  all  because 
Newman  could  not  play  second  fiddle.  He  liked  and 
admired  Newman,  but  did  not  get  on  with  his  sur- 
roundings. 

Then  there  was  a  dire  feud,  in  which  Dornford 
certainly  was  most  to  blame,  though  that  did  not 
quite  clear  the  other  side.  The  origin  of  it  was  a 
common  instance  of  the  sad  mistakes  gentlemen  of 
the  kindest  and  best  intentions  may  make  from  want 
of  consideration,  and  of  readiness  to  make  amends. 
As  the  feud  lasted  two  years,  and  very  much  affected 
the  comfort  of  the  college,  it  seems  no  violation  of 
privacy  to  state  the  cause,  especially  as  it  was  char- 
acteristic of  all  the  parties.  It  is  needless  to  premise 
that  a  matter  so  trifling  in  itself  would  have  been 
concluded  one  way  or  another  in  a  few  hours,  leaving 
only  a  passing  sore  or  a  topic  for  humorous  allusion, 
had  there  not  been  some  want  of  congeniality  to  be- 
gin with. 

The  first  quadrangle  of  the  college  consisted  of 
rooms  alternately  large  and  small.  The  large  rooms 
looked  into  the  quadrangle,  and  also  away  from  it,  in 
this  case  into  Merton  Lane,  with  Corpus  opposite. 
Between  every  two  large  rooms  were  two  small  rooms, 
each  little  more  than  a  quarter  size,  and  looking  only 
one  way.  Thus,  on  the  equal  division  which  pre- 
vailed, each  set  would  comprise  a  large  room,  a  bed- 
room, and  a  study.  This  was  more  than  enough  for 
an  undergraduate,  but  not  quite  enough  for  a  Fellow, 
who  might  be  tutor,  and  who  must  have  his  table 
clear  for  his  class  ev(!ry  day.  He  might  also  have 
some  literary  occupation  requiring  books  and  papers 
spread  out  before  his  eye.  He  might,  too,  have  pa- 
rochial duties,  besides  a  large  circle  of  acquaintances. 

vor,.  II.  5 


66 


REMINISCENCES. 


It  was  all  that  Newman  ever  bad,  except  the  bit  of 
lumber  room  already  mentioned,  over  the  chapel 
door.  Henry  Wilberforce  had  the  rooms  on  the  same 
floor  between  Newman's  and  Dornford's. 

On  returning  to  college  after  the  Long  Vacation, 
to  Henry  Wilberforce's  great  astonishment  he  saw  all 
his  books,  and  all  the  furniture  of  his  library,  piled 
in  a  heap  in  the  middle  of  his  principal  sitting-room. 
He  rushed  to  his  library  door  to  see  what  it  could  all 
be  about,  and  found  the  door  locked.  Calling  the 
"  scout,"  he  was  informed  tliat  Dornford  had  taken 
possession  of  the  library,  as  he  had  found  the  want  of 
a  fourth  room.  Henry  went  straight  off  to  his  brother 
Robert,  who  was  then  still  one  of  the  tutors.  Rob- 
ert at  once  wrote  a  note  to  Dornford,  expostulating 
on  the  act  altogether,  particularly  on  its  being  done 
without  notice.  Dornford  replied  that  it  had  been 
done  in  the  interest  of  the  college,  that  the  tutors 
had  a  prior  claim  to  accommodation,  and  tliat  no  un- 
dergraduate really  wanted  more  than  a  sitting-room 
and  a  bedi'oom.  Nor  had  he  thought  it  necessary  to 
write  to  an  undergi-aduate  on  the  matter.  Robert 
rejoined,  observing  that  Dornford  might  at  least  have 
written  to  his  fellow  tutor,  the  undergraduate's 
brother.  The  correspondence  shortly  arrived  at  that 
pass  beyond  which  it  could  not  further  go.  It  is 
scarcely  an  extenuation  of  Dornford's  rudeness  that 
he  had  now  by  seniority  acquired  the  right  to  two 
sets  of  rooms,  a  right,  however,  never  exercised  by 
actual  occupation.    The  breach  was  irreconcilable. 

Henry  had  to  attend  Dornfoi'd's  lectures,  and  Rob- 
ert had  to  meet  him  in  the  hall  and  common  room. 
So  it  assumed  the  form  of  a  bitter  family  jar,  more 
noisy  and  disagreeable  than  sullen.    For  near  two 


^    DORNFORD  STILL  TUTOR.  67 

years,  so  it  seems  to  the  memory,  though  perhaps  one 
year  would  be  nearer  the  true  reckoning,  it  was  im- 
possible for  either  Doruford  or  R.  Wilberforce  to 
open  his  mouth  without  the  other  cutting  in  with 
something  slap  the  other  way.  If  there  were  twenty 
men  in  the  common  room,  and  throe  or  four  distinct 
conversations  going  on,  each  of  the  two  belligerents 
would  have  an  ear  in  reserve  for  what  he  could  catch 
from  the  other,  even  across  the  room,  and  would  seize 
the  first  opportunity  of  recognizing  a  point  of  differ- 
ence. The  challenge  was  always  eagerly  and  bitterly 
accepted.  They  finally  left  residence  within  a  few 
months  of  one  another. 

Robert  Wilberforce  was  doing  no  little  injury  to 
his  cause  by  keeping  up  the  quarrel,  foi',  as  it  ap- 
peared by  the  result,  he  was  only  driving  away  a 
would-be  partisan.  Dornford  had  forsworn  Simeon 
long  ago,  and  now  held  loose  to  Symons.  He  had  al- 
w^ays  kept  aloof  from  the  synagogue  at  St.  Edmund 
Hall.  He  had  a  great  wish  to  be  "  High  Chui-ch." 
So  he  now  found  himself  nowhere  in  Oxford. 

It  was  about  this  time,  though  I  cannot  recall  the 
exact  date,  that  Dornford  took  a  tour  in  Spain,  re- 
visiting his  battle-fields.  His  prevailing  idea  was 
great  change  and  oblivion  of  the  past.  One  incident 
had  made  a  deep  impression  on  him,  and  he  told  it 
with  evident  gusto.  At  Madrid  he  had  met  an  Irish 
captain  who  had  been  many  years  in  the  Spanish  ser- 
vice. He  had  a  great  trouble,  indeed  a  grievance. 
At  his  death  his  widow  would  be  entitled  to  a  pen- 
sion of  fifty  pounds  a  year.  Not  being  married,  he 
would  not  leave  a  widow,  and  would  thereby  lose  his 
rights.  But  a  brother  of  his  in  Ireland  had  several 
daughters.    So  he  sent  to  his  brother  a  formal  offer 


68  REMINISCENCES. 

It 

of  marriage  to  be  delivered  to  the  daughters  in  the 
order  of  senioritj^  with  the  explanation  that  they 
need  not  stick  at  the  relationship,  as  a  dispensation 
could  easily  be  obtained,  and  such  marriages  were 
common  in  Spain.  They  all  declined  the  offer,  and 
the  poor  captain  thought  they  were  not  only  very  un- 
wise, and  rather  unkind,  but  hardly  true  to  their 
country  for  not  giving  it  the  benefit  of  the  Spanish 
pension.  As  it  happened,  Dornford  had  not  a 
brother,  but  a  half -nephew,  by  his  father's  side,  with 
a  numerous  family. 

Dornford  had  done  his  duty  many  years  at  Oriel, 
and  now  found  himself  one  of  the  forlorn  hope  on 
the  Provost's  side  in  his  contest  with  the  tutors.  It 
was  a  question  of  authority,  and  he  stuck  gallantly 
to  the  commanding  officer.  Nor  did  he  want  to  have 
to  get  up  any  more  books,  for  he  was  already  tired 
of  it.  Liking  his  position  less  and  less,  he  was  glad 
to  accept  a  small  living  in  the  heart  of  Devonshire, 
fondly  hoping  to  find  there  a  calmer  and  sweeter 
atmosphere.  At  his  last  college  meeting  he  had  a 
favor  to  ask.  He  had  served  the  college  long;  he 
felt  that  he  had  given  his  day  and  his  strength  to  it, 
and  that  he  had  a  claim.  He  had  always  been 
grieved  by  the  case  of  the  "  Bible  Clerks."  Every 
day  one  of  them  had  walked  into  the  hall  to  say  the 
"  grace,"  and  had  then  walked  out  again,  only  to  re- 
turn to  say  the  "  grace  after  meat."  Both  the  Bible 
Clerks  then  sat  down,  and,  while  the  servants  were 
hastily  clearing  the  tables,  satisfied  their  hunger  on 
the  leavings.  These  were  the  sons  of  gentlemen,  as 
it  happened  of  clergymen,  of  as  good  family  as  any 
there,  nay  related  to  some  of  them. 

What  Dornford  asked  was  that  they  should  dine 


DORNFORD  STILL  TUTOR. 


69 


with  the  other  undergraduates,  and  thereby  have 
their  social  equality  recognized.  At  present  they 
were  "  cut."  They  were  not  asked  to  meet  other 
undergraduates,  and  they  only  consorted  with  their 
brother  pariahs  in  the  other  colleges.  Some  of  these 
men  had  distinguished  themselves,  and  had  then  a 
sad  tale  to  tell  of  the  college.  The  question  was  dis- 
cussed, for  there  were  two  sides  to  it.  There  would 
be  no  special  openings  for  poor  men  if  the  change 
were  made,  for  a  rich  man  would  ask  for  a  Bible 
clerkship,  when  there  was  no  longer  a  social  disquali- 
fication in  it.  However,  there  was  no  resisting  the 
appeal,  and  Dornford  abolished  what  to  all  had  long 
been  a  painful  system. 

I  succeeded  Dornford  in  the  small  Northampton- 
shire living,  which  he  had  held  with  his  fellowship, 
as  I  did  then  for  four  years.  From  that  time  I  was 
continually  learning  fresh  instances  of  the  singular 
fascination  which  Dornford  innocently,  and  indeed 
unconsciously,  exercised  over  what,  in  this  matter,  I 
must  call  the  weaker  sex.  I  counted  half  a  dozen 
victims  of  whom  there  could  be  no  doubt.  Two  I 
give. 

There  were  many  old  soldiers  in  the  place.  One 
of  them  knew  that  he  was  entitled  to  a  considerable 
sum  for  arrears  of  pay,  or  prize-money,  but  did  not 
know  how  to  get  it.  Dornford  took  the  matter  in 
hand,  and  got  the  money  for  him.  He  had  hardly 
done  this  when  the  soldier  died,  and  then  the  rest  of 
the  business  had  to  be  done  with  his  dauofhtex",  a  fine 
strapping  lass,  of  a  fair  complexion,  honest  and  sim- 
ple, but  very  gipsyfied  in  her  manner  and  style  of 
dress.  She  had  often  to  see  Dornford  ;  indeed,  there 
was  then  nobody  else  interested  for  lier.  Everybody 


70 


REMIXISCENCES. 


told  me  she  was  persuaded  Dornford  meant  to  marry 
her.  In  a  year  or  so  I  had  notice  of  her  marriage,  to 
come  off  as  soon  as  the  banns  could  be  published. 
Nobody  knew  anything  of  the  man,  and  I  was  anx- 
ious to  see  him.  The  day  came,  and  I  was  conster- 
nated to  see  a  mean  little  fellow,  with  a  bad  figure 
and  a  worse  expression,  altogether  most  unpromis- 
ing. Only  three  days  after  the  marriage  she  sud- 
denly presented  herself  :  "  Can't  you  unmarry  me  ? 
Please,  sir,  undo  it  if  you  can.  I  cannot  live  with 
that  man,  and  I  won't."  I  could  only  entreat  her  to 
make  the  best  of  it.  They  went  far  away,  and  I 
never  heard  the  sequel ;  but  it  was  evident  she  was 
thoroughly  possessed  with  an  ideal  she  was  never 
likely  to  find  realized  in  her  class  of  life. 

The  other  victim  had  less  excuse.  She  was  a  mar- 
ried lady,  the  wife  of  a  rather  distinguished  clergy- 
man, a  fine-looking  woman,  and,  as  will  appear,  of 
free  address,  occasionally  visiting  in  that  neighbor- 
hood. She  got  on  wonderfully  with  Dornford  when 
she  chanced  to  meet  him.  SitliiijT  at  the  drawing- 
room  window  of  Edgcott  parsonage,  watching  the 
arrivals  at  a  clerical  meeting,  she  thus  freely,  unre- 
servedly, and  audibly  expressed  herself.  "  You  never 
see  a  man  in  these  days.  I  don't  call  a  creature 
always  looking  to  the  ground,  ashamed  to  look  you 
in  the  face,  and  with  nothing  to  say  for  himself,  a 
man.  He  may  be  a  scholar,  and  a  clergyman,  but  he 
is  not  a  man.  I  don't  call  my' husband  a  man,  and  I 
tell  him  so.  Now,  there 's  a  man  if  you  like.  He 's 
worth  all  of  them."  These  last  words  she  said  as 
she  saw  Dornford  opening  the  gate  of  the  lawn  be- 
fore the  parsonage. 

The  spiritual  affairs  of  Moreton  Pinckney  Dorn- 


DORNFORD  STILL  TUTOR. 


71 


ford  placed  in  the  hands  of  his  mother,  Simeon's 
chief  female  friend.  She  came  there  from  Cam- 
bridge, held  little  meetings,  and  selected  the  curates 
in  charge,  who  were  of  her  school.  One  of  them 
added  to  the  Christian  faith  a  confident  belief  that 
by  a  proper  use  of  the  three  qualities  of  Morrison's 
pills  you  might  live  forever.  Dornford  put  a  Bap- 
tist into  the  glebe  farm,  whose  wife  went  the  round 
of  the  parish  every  Monday  morning,  distributing 
tracts.  However,  they  were  good  sort  of  people,  and 
paid  their  rent.  When  I  went  to  see  my  parish,  the 
first  thing  that  struck  my  eye  was  a  lai'ge  and  hand- 
some Baptist  chapel  just  completed. 


CHAPTER  LXXX. 


DORNTOED,  BECTOR  OF  PLYMTREE. 

In  Devonshire  Dornford  felt  more  at  liberty.  He 
devoured  Newman's  works,  and  the  other  publica- 
tions of  the  school,  as  fast  as  they  came  out,  and  by 
and  by  ripened  into  what  people  in  those  days  called 
a  "  Tractarian."  His  admiration  of  Newman  became 
warmer  and  deeper  every  year,  and  showed  itself  in 
surprising  forms  at  his  annual  visits  to  Oxford.  He 
did  not  observe  that  while  his  own  development  had 
been  rapid.  Oriel  men  could  only  remember  him  as 
he  had  stood  in  1832.  He  expected  his  parish  to  fol- 
low the  leader,  but  he  could  not  convert  them,  and 
they  refused  to  enlist.  He  tried  to  press  them,  but 
in  vain,  and  there  ensued  a  long  and  lamentable  war, 
in  which  both  sides  behaved  about  as  ill  as  they 
could  possibly  do. 

The  failure  was  not  wholly  referable  to  the  obsti- 
nacy of  rustic  Protestantism.  Dornford  started  with 
immense  natural  and  acquired  advantages.  Half  the 
parish  he  had  immediately,  and  always,  and  to  the 
bitter  end,  entirely  on  his  side.  That  was  the  weaker 
sex,  with  whom  he  was  perfectly  irresistible.  Had 
it  been  left  to  them,  long  ere  this  eveiy  child  in  the 
parish  would  have  been  born  with  Hymns  Ancient 
and  Modern  on  the  tip  of  its  tongue,  and  with  its 
ears  attuned  to  the  new  melodies.  But  it  is  difficult 
to  be  loved  too  much  by  one  sex,  and  enough  by  the 


DORNFORD,  RECTOR  OF  PLYMTREE. 


73 


other.  The  gruff  husbands  and  stern  fathers  were 
not  indisposed  to  pick  a  quarrel  with  the  man  whose 
mere  presence  seemed  to  elicit  smiles  from  cai'eworn 
faces,  and  wit  from,  silent  tongues. 

The  opportunity  came  when  Dornford,  after  adorn- 
ing his  chancel  with  much  carved  woodwork,  metal- 
work,  and  bits  of  old  painted  glass  from  Wai'dour 
Street,  introduced  some  alterations  in  his  mode  of 
conducting  the  service.  Amons;  other  matters  the 
anthem  before  the  sermon  had  alwaj's  tried  his  tem- 
per, but  when  the  village  choir  showed  an  increasing 
tendency  to  encroach  on  the  time  allotted  for  the  ser- 
mon, he  one  Sunday  took  the  opportunity  of  a  pause, 
exclaimed  in  a  warm  tone,  "  Enough  of  that,"  and 
began  his  sermon.  The  choir  walked  out  of  church, 
and  never  reentered  it  in  Dornford's  lifetime.  The 
candlesticks  disappeared  from  the  altar,  and  all  kinds 
of  outrages  were  committed.  The  farmers  put  up 
some  young  lads  of  a  degenerate  county  family  to 
steal  into  the  parsonage  grounds  and  make  havoc  of 
the  shrubs  and  the  choice  pines.  But  they  did  worse 
than  that. 

The  young,  pretty,  and  better  educated  wife  of  a 
substantial  yoeman,  with  the  courage  of  her  sex, 
avowed  and  proved  her  sympathy  with  the  persecuted 
Rector,  calling  upon  him  about  the  Church  music 
and  otlier  matters.  The  enemy  waited  for  her  one 
day,  and  fired  guns  over  the  hedge.  She  ran  home  as 
if  for  her  life,  and  died  a  few  days  after.  Her  two 
children  followed  her,  still  in  their  infancy.  Dorn- 
ford's hand  appeared  in  a  lofty  altar  tomb,  sur- 
rounded by  iron  railings,  with  a  long  and  touching 
inscription.  The  vault  had  to  be  opened  thirty 
years  afterwards  to  receive  a  relative.    It  had  be- 


74 


REMINISCENCES. 


come  a  reservoir,  and  had  to  be  emptied  with  mucli 
labor.  Water  bad  performed  tlie  effects  of  fire,  and 
nothing  remained  but  some  shovelfuls  of  charred 
debris^  and  a  tangled  mass  which  had  once  been  a 
beautiful  head  of  hair.  As  tlie  widower  was  to  be 
there  next  day,  a  cofiin  was  hastily  made  to  receive 
these  sad  fragments.  "Why  so  large?"  I  asked 
when  I  saw  it.  The  answer  was,  "  To  make  the  old 
gentleman  think  there's  something  left  of  his  wife 
and  children."  A  drain  was  then  made,  and  within 
two  years  the  vault  was  opened  again  to  receive  the 
widower  himself,  a  kind,  grave,  business-Uke  man. 
His  consolation  for  many  years  had  been  the  care  of 
the  parish  charities,  as  secretary  to  the  Feoffees,  and 
in  the  faithful  discharge  of  that  responsibility  he 
made  me  pay,  nothing  loth,  more  than  twice  the  very 
outside  value  of  some  wretched  hovels  that  I  took 
down  for  the  improvement  of  the  churchyard  and  the 
surrounding  communications. 

The  vestry  meetings  were  tumults,  in  which  Dorn- 
ford's  sole  ambition  was  not  to  be  beaten  in  the  strife 
of  tongues.  He  would  be  as  sharp  as  any  of  them, 
and  if  wounded  feelings  were  to  be  the  measure  of 
defeat,  he  was  always  victorious.  On  one  occasion 
his  chief  antagonist  exclaimed  with  tragic  earnest- 
ness,  "  If  Mr.  Dornford  would  get  a  missus  of  his 
own  it  would  be  better  for  he  and  better  for  we." 
This  was  charming.  The  most  abject  submission 
could  not  have  pleased  Dornford  better.  The  poor 
farmer's  wish,  however,  was  at  last  fulfilled,  and  it 
did  not  entirely  fail  to  justify  a  saying  of  Newman's, 
which  had  in  its  nature  the  force  of  prophecy.  He 
used  to  compare  Dornford  to  Undine  before  she  had 
the  gift  of  a  soul ;  a  creature  full  of  good  instincts, 
tastes,  and  impulses,  but  in  no  form  or  whole. 


DORNFORD,  RECTOR  OF  PLYJITREE. 


75 


Dovnford  had  his  admirers  in  the  stronger  sex. 
His  tastes  were  manly,  and  the  poor  men  of  his 
parish  who  were  not  in  direct  collision  with  him,  and 
"who  could  call  their  souls  and  their  tongues  their 
own,  were  proud  of  his  figure  and  bearing,  and  of 
the  good  presentation  of  the  parish  he  made  to  the 
world.  These  out  of  the  way  villages  have  few 
things  to  be  proud  of,  and  they  think  as  much  of  a 
tall,  handsome,  well-built  parson  as  of  a  fine  church 
tower.  The  great  ambition  of  Dornford's  life  was  to 
drive  a  good  pair  of  horses  home  from  Exeter  to  his 
parsonage  in  an  hour.  As  the  distance  was  thirteen 
miles,  and  there  were  some  rather  stiff  ups  and  downs, 
besides  several  miles  of  bad  road,  the  least  detention 
was  fatal.  Indeed  an  hour  and  two  minutes  was  all 
ever  acliieved.  Upon  leaving  the  broad  turnpike 
Dornford  would  sometimes  find  the  narrow  lane 
blocked  by  a  stout  farmer,  with  a  lumbering  trap  and 
a  poor  beast.  The  farmer  would  not  or  could  not 
drive  a  wheel  up  into  the  bank  to  allow  of  the  Rector 
driving  by  without  any  abatement  of  speed.  On 
these  occasions  he  would  deliver  his  mind  to  the  big- 
gest man  in  his  parish  with  a  freedom  and  plainness 
of  speech  which  delighted  the  laborers,  not  quite  so 
much  in  the  way  of  rivalry,  or  collision  with  the 
Rector,  as  their  employei-s.  Servants,  too,  have  often 
seen  more  of  the  world,  and  are  more  men  of  the 
world  than  their  masters. 

When  I  came  to  Plymtree  there  was  a  fine  elderly 
man,  a  sad  cripple,  for  one  of  his  thighs  had  been 
badly  broken.  He  had  been  Dornford's  gardener 
and  groom.  He  had  often  said  a  word  to  his  master 
about  his  taking  the  sharp  corners  too  closely.  It  is 
a  Devonshire  failing.    There  are  more  sharp  corners 


76 


REMINISCENCES. 


there  than  anywhere  else  in  the  kingdom,  and  every- 
body takes  them  as  close  as  he  can.  The  result  is,  no- 
where else  are  there  so  many  broken  legs,  arms,  and 
collar-bones,  not  to  speak  of  worse  casualties.  The 
gardener's  warnings  were  in  vain,  for  one  day  they 
were,  all  upset  and  the  poor  man  wrecked  for  life. 
Neither  he  nor  his  wife,  also  an  old  servant  of  Dorn- 
ford's,  could  ever  speak  of  him  without  tears  of  affec- 
tion. He  left  them  a  trifle,  but  it  did  not  last  long, 
and  then  they  had  to  come  on  the  parish.  But  they 
did  not  the  less  love  their  master's  memory.  To  an- 
other couple  of  old  servants  was  confided  the  care  of 
his  grave,  and  no  grave  in  the  county  was  kept  bet- 
ter, or  so  often  supplied  with  new  flowers. 

All  had  stories  to  tell  of  the  old  master's  courage 
and  spirit,  so  deai'ly  does  that  class  love  freedom, 
even  in  its  wilder  forms.  In  the  eyes  of  the  rustic 
population  the  man  who  had  had  the  last  word,  or 
who  had  done  the  sauciest  thing,  was  the  conqueror, 
at  whatever  cost  of  injured  feelings.  They  would 
laugh  as  they  related  that  at  a  tithe  dinner  Dornford 
had  suddenly  risen  from  his  chair,  put  his  dog  in  it 
with  the  injunction  to  entertain  the  company  in  his 
"  absence,  and  had  not  returned  till  late  in  the  even- 
ing- 

On  one  occasion,  with  the  best  intentions,  he  cer- 
tainly came  off  the  worst.  After  wrangling  with  a 
farmer  till  his  powers  of  argument  failed  to  reach  the 
understanding,  he  said  rashly  and  rudely,  "  I  cannot 
make  you  see  this,  for  none  can  see  it  but  gentlemen." 
"  What 's  a  gentleman  ?  "  said  the  farmer.  Dornford, 
who  had  a  very  well-formed  foot,  and  whose  boots  al- 
ways showed  it  to  advantage,  stretched  out  his  legs, 
pointed  his  toes,  and  said,  "  You  see  that  boot  ?  "  — 


DORNFORD,  RECTOR  OF  PLYMTREE. 


77 


"  Yes,  I  see  it."  —  "  Well,  the  difference  between  a 
gentleman  and  a  man  who  is  not  a  gentleman,  is  the 
same  as  that  between  my  boot  and  yours,"  pointing 
to  the  farmer's.  On  this  the  farmer  said,  "  I 've  got 
a  pair  of  boots  upstairs  made  by  the  best  bootmaker 
in  Exeter.  I 've  only  to  put  them  on,  and  I  am  as 
good  a  gentleman  as  you  are  !  " 

The  rupture  with  the  farmers  was  complete.  They 
gathei'ed  round  the  single  nonconformist  family  in 
the  parish,  built  a  handsome  and  capacious  chapel, 
with  an  educated  man  for  a  minister,  with  an  organ, 
and  most  of  the  rebellious  choir. 

In  the  world  at  large,  whether  in  the  University 
or  in  Devonshire,  Dornford  was  always  and  every- 
where a  popuhir  man.  He  was  never  at  a  loss  for 
talk,  and  he  could  tell  any  number  of  stories,  not  a 
few  with  the  flavor  of  the  camp.  A  good  representa- 
tion of  the  county  annually  assembled  on  his  lawn  to 
celebrate  the  anniversary  of  the  chief  battle  he  was 
engaged  in,  which  the  villagers  natui'ally  understood 
to  be  Waterloo.  Even  the  cathedral  dignitaries,  gen- 
erally as  immovable  as  the  castle  in  chess,  often  came 
where  they  were  sure  to  meet  everybody  and  hear 
sometliing  new. 

Why  was  Dornford  a  bachelor  so  long  ?  He  was 
handsome,  tall,  with  a  fine  figui-e  and  upright  bearing, 
the  readiest  of  addresses,  and  a  good  ringing  voice. 
It  was  not  for  want  of  good  intentions  that  he  re- 
mained so  long  in  that  single  blessedness  which  most 
of.  his  Tractarian  friends  so  highly  extolled  and  so 
quickly  renounced.  An  avenue  of  seventeen  cypresses 
in  his  garden  had  been  the  monuments  of  as  many 
unsuccessful  courtships.  I  found  their  places  sup- 
plied by  rhododendrons.    His  mode  of  address  was 


78 


REMINISCENCES. 


too  gallant :  there  was  too  much  strutting  and  crow- 
ing in  it.  English  ladies,  accused  as  they  are  of  be- 
ing ready  to  meet  advances  at  least  half  way,  yet  ex- 
pect a  little  coyness,  a  little  shyness,  a  little  reserve, 
and  Dornford  had  none.  He  was  all  his  life,  till  long 
past  sixty,  making  up  for  the  fatal  omission  in  his 
Peninsular  service,  storming  the  citadel.  The  la- 
dies all  laughed  at  him  behind  his  back,  and  having 
laughed  at  him,  could  not,  or  would  not,  and  at  all 
events  did  not,  accept  him.  So  he  went  on  incom- 
plete till  at  last  he  settled  into  a  quiet  domestic  mar- 
riage which  marvellously  composed  him  and  his  poor 
parish,  though  things  had  gone  too  far  to  be  entirely 
righted  in  his  time.  Perhaps  this  was  the  soul  which 
Newman  had,  by  implication  and  certainly  without 
knowing  it,  prophesied  for  him. 

One  or  two  things  must  be  added.  Henry  of  Exe- 
ter was  always  glad  to  see  Dornford,  though  he  had 
sometimes  to  administer  a  gentle  reprimand.  "  Mr. 
Dornford,  are  those  white  trousers  quite  clerical  ?  " 
"  Oh,  my  lord,  they 've  washed  white,"  he  said,  in 
excuse.  "  Then  I  presume,"  replied  he  of  Exeter, 
"  that  your  necktie  has  washed  black."  I  may  ven- 
ture to  add  that,  knowing  Dornford  .as  pupil,  as 
brother  Fellow,  as  successor  in  his  first  living,  and 
afterwards  frequently  meeting  him,  I  had  never  even 
a  momentary  ruffle  with  him,  and  never  any  feeling 
short  of  admiration  and  kindly  regard. 

Dornford  adorned  his  parsonage  inside  and  out 
with  old  oak  carving  of  all  ages  and  styles.  He  had 
a  bedroom  full  of  old  oak  furniture,  the  wonder  and 
awe  of  the  neighborhood.  A  passage  room  he  fitted 
up  as  an  oratory,  with  a  magnificent  and  costly  rere- 
dos,  containing  the  Passion  in  five  compartments,  and 


DORNFORD,  RECTOR  OF  PLYMTREE. 


79 


a  multitude  of  figures;  pictures,  too,  not  admissible 
into  an  Anglican  church.  As  the  oratory  was  con- 
demned by  niy  architect,  and  no  other  place  could 
be  found  for  the  reredos,  I  had  to  ask  Mrs.  Dorn- 
ford's  consent  to  its  presentation  to  the  Albert  Mu- 
seum at  Exeter.  It  might  be  the  genius  loci  that  was 
moving  Dornford  in  this  direction,  without  his  know- 
ing it.  I  cannot  gather  that  he  was  ever  awai'e  that 
the  parsonage  is  built  within  an  ancient  refectory. 
He  would  indeed  have  been  surprised  to  find  that 
within  a  yard  of  his  head,  as  he  sat  by  the  dining- 
room  fire,  there  was  hid  under  lath,  plaster,  and  pa- 
per-hangings a  beautiful  oak  screen,  like  those  in  col- 
lege halls,  which  must  have  seen  the  Wars  of  the 
Roses. 


CHAPTER  LXXXI. 


SAMUEL  RICKAEDS  AT  ULCOMBE. 

I  (X)ULD  not  say  how  soon  I  beard  a  name  that  was 
the  object  of  loving  and  reverential  regard  to  Oriel 
men.  Samuel  Rickards  must  have  matriculated  at 
Oriel  in  1813.  His  pretty  poem  on  the  "  Temple  of 
Theseus  "  won  the  prize  in  1815,  and  is  pervaded  by 
a  tone  of  triumphant  patriotism  suggestive  of  the 
period.  He  took  a  second  class  at  Easter,  1817,  was 
elected  Fellow  of  his  college,  and  in  1819  won  the 
prize  by  a  thoughtful  and  interesting  essay  on  the 
"  Characteristic  Differences  of  Greek  and  Latin  Poe- 
try." 

He  married  the  daughter  of  a  Derbyshire  baronet, 
still  living,  if  this  page  sees  the  light  as  soon  as  I 
hope  it  will.  The  couple  were  unequalled,  one  might 
confidently  say,  in  the  world  ;  for  as  he  would  have 
been  the  making  of  any  wife,  so  she  vpould  have  been 
the  making  of  any  husband.  There  could  not  be  any 
other  two  people  combining  together  so  large  a  share 
of  the  sweet  and  serious  elements  that  make  Chris- 
tian converse.  I  never  heard  of  any  one  who  was  not 
charmed  with  Rickards.  Ladies  sometimes  say  queer 
things  to  one  another.  A  lady  who  was  to  be  mar- 
ried the  next  day  confided  to  Mrs.  Rickards  her  pain- 
ful misgivings.  "  My  dear,"  said  Mrs.  Rickards, 
"  the  day  before  I  married  I  was  the  happiest  of 
women."    "  Oh,  but  you  were  going  to  marrj-^  Mr. 


SAMUEL  RICKARDS  AT  ULCOMBE. 


81 


Rickards,"  the  expectant  bride  innocently  exclaimed. 
It  was  very  simple  on  her  part,  but  I  may  say  I  do 
not  know  any  man  whom  I  could  compare  as  a  hus- 
band with  Samuel  Rickards.  They  were  as  two  lights 
and  two  flames  continually  lighting  and  warming  one 
another. 

Rickards  had  a  full  experience  of  Oriel  of  the  old 
school.  Whately  paid  him  a  visit  shortly  after  his 
marriage.  From  what  transpired,  though  Whately 
himself  put  it  in  another  form,  he  must  then  and 
there  have  been  moved  to  matrimony.  Rickards 
took  the  living  of  Ulcombe,  in  Kent,  not  far  from 
Eastwell  House,  where  Lord  Winchilsea  showed  by 
many  marks  of  attention  how  much  he  valued  his  new 
neighbors.  As  in  a  general  sense  they  were  agreed 
both  in  religion  and  politics,  this  promised  a  long 
course  of  happy  cooperation ;  but  Rickards  found 
himself,  after  some  years,  a  caged  bird.  How  this 
came  to  be  I  could  not  say  exactly.  Lord  Winchil- 
sea's  extreme  opinions  and  uncontrollable  temper 
would  be  likely  enough  to  create  embari'assments, 
for  such  men  expect  everybody  to  go  all  lengths 
with  them.  However,  Ulcombe  was  a  very  pleasant 
house,  and  it  was  here  that  Rickards  was  visited  by 
a  succession  of  Oriel  friends. 

It  was  here  that  Newman  wrote  in  the  Long 
Vacation,  after  he  had  taken  Jelf's  place  in  the  tutor- 
ship, upon  preparing  to  return  to  Oxford,  the  poem 
on  "Nature  and  Art,"  in  which,  even  after  describ- 
ing Oxford,  and  the  material  fabrics  of  the  Church  of 
England,  under  the  head  of  Art,  he  vowed  perpetual 
allegiance  to  Nature  as  the  true  home  and  manifest 
work  of  Omnipotence.    The  album  in  which  these 

VOL.  II.  6 


82 


REMINISCENCES. 


verses  were  written,  must  have  been  Mrs,  Rickards', 
and  there  could  not  be  fitter  receptacle. 

Her  husband  and  herself  both  resembled  Ella- 
combe,  of  whom  I  have  spoken  above,  in  their  univer- 
sal knowledge  of  nature.  It  would  be  no  exagfjeration 
to  apply  to  them  the  description  of  King  Solomon's 
atbiinments  in  natural  history.  They  noted  every- 
thing, and  whatever  came  within  their  compass  they 
found  a  place  for  in  their  little  domain,  which  be- 
came in  consequence  very  crowded.  The  instant  a 
new  specimen  arrived  it  was  planted  and  watered. 
If  it  throve  it  soon  acquired  fixity  of  tenure,  and 
had  nothing  to  fear  except  from  its  stronger  and  more 
aggressive  neighbors. 

Long  before  I  knew  Rickards,  indeed  soon  after  his 
becoming  a  Fellow  of  Oriel,  he  and  a  college  friend 
resolved  to  make  some  original  essay  in  the  region  of 
Inductive  Philosophy.  They  settled  on  the  science 
of  handwriting,  if  science  there  should  be  found  in  it. 
They  collected  some  hundreds  of  specimens  of  hand- 
writing that  they  knew;  and  first  separately,  then 
together,  wrote  down  the  characteristics  both  of  the 
writing  and  of  the  writers.  When  the  same  char- 
acteristic running  through  many  handwritings  was 
found  to  go  with  some  mental  characteristic  running 
through  every  writer,  this  became  a  law  ;  and  thus 
a  system  was  arrived  at.  Rickards  would  never  di- 
vulge this  system,  for  he  felt  that  a  secret  of  char- 
acter, as  he  found  handwriting  to  be,  ought  not  to  be 
placed  in  all  hands.  He  really  was  all  but  infalli- 
ble in  his  application  of  the  system,  insomuch  that 
he  latterly  refused  to  give  an  opinion  upon  hands  at 
once,  and  would  only  give  one  confidentially.  The 
system  gave  him  access  to  the  secrets  of  the  heart, 


SAMUEL  KICKARDS  AT  ULCOMBE. 


83 


for  he  frequently  told  the  writers  that  which  nobody 
knew  but  themselves,  and  which  perhaps  they  then, 
for  the  first  time  recognized. 

In  one  or  two  cases,  and  where  I  knew  the  writer, 
I  should  have  supposed  Rickards  well  acquainted 
with  the  man  and  his  history,  though  it  turned  out 
he  knew  nothing  of  him  but  a  bit  of  his  handwriting. 
In  some  cases  he  indicated  the  mental  faculties  which 
had  still  to  be  shown  in  action.  Of  a  well-knowu 
Oxford  professor's  handwriting  which  he  had  never 
seen  before,  he  said  that  the  writer  was  both  a  country 
gentleman  and  a  University  man,  that  he  combined 
two  professions  and  wore  heavy  boots.  The  wi-iter 
lived  at  Oxford  and  was  a  good  scholar,  but  was 
never  happy  except  in  country  occupations ;  he  had 
been  a  tutor  and  he  was  a  physician ;  and  he  was 
remarkable  for  his  heavy  boots. 

Rickards  made  mistakes,  but  they  had  their  sig- 
nificance. Of  the  Duke  of  Wellington's  hand  he 
said,  "  This  man  will  never  marry."  Certainly  the 
married  state  was  the  least  developed  of  the  hero's 
many  relations.  On  being  shown  Mrs.  Fry's  hand- 
writing, he  began,  "  This  man,"  etc.  I  am  bound 
to  add  that  on  my  telling  this  very  inconsiderately 
to  Miss  Marsh,  authoress  of  "English  Hearts  and 
Hands,"  she  immediately  related  several  most  touch- 
ing incidents,  bringing  out  the  womanly  features  of 
Mrs.  Fry's  character. 

There  is  a  phase  of  life  which  once  helped  much 
to  vary  the  monotony  of  society,  which  furnished  the 
novelists  of  the  last  century  with  their  most  surpris- 
ing incidents,  and  contributed  remarkable  experiences 
to  many  now  living.  It  was  the  evening  which  fre- 
quently had  to  be  spent  at  some  small  country  inn, 


84 


EEJIINISCENCES. 


sometimes  in  the  only  parlor,  and  in  company  which, 
casual  as  it  was,  might  be  agreeable  and  instructive. 
That  is  all  of  the  past.  England  can  now  be  trav- 
ersed in  anj'  direction  in  a  day,  so  there  is  no  need  to 
put  up  anywhere  for  the  night.  Rickards  was  once 
in  this  case.  He  was  ordering  his  dinner,  wJien  the 
waiter  told  him  another  gentleman  was  about  to  dine. 
Perhaps  he  would  not  object  to  join  him.  Rickards 
assented.  It  was  a  pleasant  elderly  man  of  business. 
They  soon  got  into  conversation.  As  they  talked, 
they  seemed  to  be  drawing  to  a  narrower  circle. 
They  knew  something  of  the  same  places  and  the 
same  names.  It  was  not  till  late  in  the  evening 
they  discovered  they  were  brothers,  that  is,  on  the 
father's  side.  The  stranger  was  of  the  first  family, 
and  had  been  settled  out  in  the  world  before  the 
father  married  again  and  Samuel  was  born.  So 
they  had  never  seen  one  another.  The  only  other 
relative  of  Rickards  I  ever  heard  of  was  his  sister, 
Mrs.  Pearce,  who  was  singularly  unlike  him  in  all 
respects. 

I  believe  I  knew  one  other  instance  of  a  man  not 
having  seen  his  own  brother.  Edward  Blencowe,  of 
W'hom  I  shall  have  to  speak,  had  a  brother  more  than 
thirty  years  older  than  himself,  still  older  in  frame 
and  in  character  than  in  years,  in  my  Northampton- 
shire neighborhood. 


CHAPTER  LXXXII. 


SAMUEL  RICKARDS  AT  STOWLANGTOFT. 

At  last  there  came  the  not  undesired  opportunity 
of  change.  Among  Rickards'  college  friends  was 
Henry  Wilson,  who,  besides  excellent  abilities  and 
much  goodness,  in  the  ordinary  sense  of  that  word, 
was  just  the  most  kind-hearted  of  men.  He  was  the 
only  son  of  Mr.  Wilson,  of  Highbury,  the  head  of  a 
large  house  of  business  in  the  City.  The  father  had 
bought  the  estate  of  Stowlangtoft,  with  the  living,  a 
few  miles  from  Bury  St.  Edmund's,  and  he  had  placed 
his  son  there.  The  living  fell  vacant,  and  Henry 
Wilson  offered  it  at  once  to  Rickards,  hardly  taking 
a  denial,  even  if  Rickards  had  returned  one,  which 
he  did  not.  Wilson  built  for  him  a  handsome  and 
capacious  parsonage,  of  the  white  brick  Suffolk  is 
proud  of,  and  soon,  to  Lord  Winchilsea's  great  grief, 
the  family  was  in  its  new  home. 

The  scenery  was  a  sad  downfall  after  that  pic- 
tured in  "  Nature  and  Art."  When  Lord  Maidstone 
came  to  be  a  pupil  there  he  would  stand  on  a  mound 
in  Stowlangtoft  churchyard,  which  the  parsonage 
grounds  adjoined,  and  say,  "  Now  I  am  on  the  top  of 
the  highest  hill  in  all  the  county  of  Suffolk."  The 
site  was  at  least  the  best  in  the  villacre,  known  to  be 
the  site  of  a  Roman  camp  by  the  large  white  snails 
surviving  there.  Yet  the  place  had  its  charms.  The 
magnificent  church  was  one  of  forty,  built  and  served 


86 


REMINISCENCES. 


by  the  abbey  of  St.  Edinnnd's,  and  it  was  -said  the 
architect  of  them  all  selected  this  to  be  buried  in. 
The  county  was  thoroughly  rural  and  primitive.  Stow- 
langtoft  Hall  lay  at  the  level  of  a  small  stream  half 
a  mile  from  the  church.  Very  soon  did  the  Richards 
know  everything  living  or  growing  in  the  parish,  if 
it  could  possibly  emerge  into  notice.  In  a  parasitical 
herb  grooving  out  of  the  roots  of  a  tree  in  a  roadside 
bank,  Rickards  recognized  the  only  plant  of  Spanish 
licorice  he  had  ever  seen  in  a  wild  state,  and  proud 
was  lie  to  show  it  to  those  he  could  trust  to  keep  the 
secret.  Whatever  could  be  moved  was  brought  into 
the  rectory  garden,  which  became  an  interesting 
wilderness,  in  which  one  could  roam  about,  making 
discoveries  every  day.  Among  plants  I  had  never 
seen  or  heard  of  before  w-as  some  sweet-scented  vale- 
rian, grown  from  seeds  enclosed  in  the  cerements  of  a 
burial  probably  as  far  back  as  King  John. 

Rickards  was  in  his  church  as  he  was  in  his  own 
house  ;  and  there  he  read  and  talked  to  his  parish  as 
he  did  to  his  family  —  indeed,  to  any  one  separately. 
It  was  impossible  not  to  attend,  to  be  interested,  and 
to  leai'n.  His  style  was  wholly  devoid  of  all  that 
which  people  put  on  for  preaching  and  publishing. 
There  was  no  necessity  for  garniture  or  stilted  ex- 
pressions. The  man  hinjself,  his  voice  and  manner, 
sent  every  word  into  his  hearers,  and  when  they 
thought  of  what  he  had  siiid,  the  man,  the  voice,  and 
the  manner  rose  before  them.  The  church  —  a  large 
one  for  the  parish  —  was  always  full,  and  full,  too,  of 
listeners.  People  came  from  far  to  join  in  such  a 
service.  Mr.  Bevan,  a  banker  at  Bury,  came  over 
many  years,  lunching  at  the  parsonage,  till,  as  must 
happen  at  last  to  every  clergyman,  Rickards  found 


SAMUEL,  RICKAEDS  AT  STOWLANGTOFT.  87 


he  must  reserve  all  his  strength  for  his  day's  work, 
and  had  none  to  spare  for  even  one  congenial  visitor. 

Troubles  came,  as  they  come  everywhere.  The 
Rickards  brought  two  young  daughters,  Maria  and 
Lucy,  or  Minky  and  Lu,  as  they  were  called,  from 
Ulcombe.  I  saw  them  both  at  Stowlungtoft,  a  loving 
pair,  learning  much  and  doing  much.  They  caught 
a  fever  :  I  think  it  was  at  haymaking  in  the  damp 
meadows  about  there.  Minky  died.  Lu  survived 
with  constitutional  injuries  which  gave  her  continual 
trouble  and  pain.  After  that  it  occasionally  occurred 
to  Rickards  that  he  ought  not  to  have  left  Ulcombe, 
where  he  was  doing  a  good  work,  and  whei'e  he  had 
many  kind  friends  who  then  missed  him  much. 

Rickards  found  very  early  that  he  had  to  part 
company  with  the  Oxford  movement,  even  if  for  a 
day  he  was  heart  and  soul  with  it.  He  wrote  in  an 
expostulatory  and  warning  tone  to  Keble.  After  a 
very  short  interchange  of  letters  the  correspondence 
abruptly  ceased.  He  wrote  to  Newman  with  the 
same  result.  He  was  soon  outside  altogether.  The 
truth  was  he  had  taken  his  ground  almost  prema- 
turely on  most  questions,  if  not  all.  I  had  some  long 
discussions  with  him  in  after  years,  on  his  challenge, 
not  mine,  and  I  found  that  he  had  passed  the  stage 
of  argument.  I  maintained  that  the  disputed  text 
(Matthew  v.  32)  referred  only  to  the  case  of  cause- 
less, wanton,  and  capricious  divorce,  divorce  with  just 
cause  being  expressly  excluded  ;  and  that  consequent- 
ly the  prohibition  applied  only  to  the  case  of  wanton 
divorce,  just  divorce  being  a  matter  for  distinct  con- 
sideration. After  much  talk  Rickards  said,  "  Then 
you  hold  that  the  words  '  her  that  is  divorced '  do 
not  include  'her  that  is  justly  divorced,'  "    I  refilled 


88 


REMINISCENCES. 


that  I  did.  Whereupon  he  closed  the  books  lying 
open  before  us  and  said,  "  Then  there  can  be  no  use 
in  talking  more  about  it." 

There  came  a  very  serious  trial  of  friendship, 
which  happily  passed  through  tlie  trial.  Henry 
Wilson  stood  for  the  West  division  of  the  county  in 
the  Liberal  interest.  The  Conservatives,  particularly 
the  clergy,  at  once  inquired  whom  Rickards  was 
going  to  vote  for.  He  had  promised  his  vote  to  the 
Conservative  candidate ;  so  did  all  the  clergy  ;  and 
Wilson  lost  his  election,  it  was  universally  believed, 
through  the  fact  of  his  own  dearest  friend  voting 
against  him.  It  did  not  make  the  slightest  difference 
in  the  friendly  relation.  Wilson  was  all  this  time 
frequently  giving  Rickai'ds  the  use  of  his  carriages. 
The  clergy  of  the  neighborhood  were  then  supplying 
amongst  themselves  an  evening  service  at  the  chief 
church  at  Bury.  Rickards  asked  me  to  take  his  turn, 
and  he  went  with  me.  I  seem  to  see  now  the  head  of 
Henry  Wilson's  magnificent  high-stepping  brougham 
horse  that  took  us  there  and  back. 

Rickards  felt  much  for  the  laborers,  who  were 
then  in  a  very  restless  state  and  often  wanting  help. 
He  thought  that  whatever  he  gave  to  help  them 
ought  to  have  come  from  the  farmer  or  the  landlord, 
not  from  him,  and  that  the  wages  ought  to  be  raised 
to  meet  the  laborers'  wants.  The  employers  met 
this  with  the  simple  allegation  that  they  could  not 
afford  to  pay  more.  How  was  Rickards  to  learn  the 
true  state  of  the  case,  and  be  qualified  to  adjudicate 
between  the  laborer  and  the  farmer  ?  So  he  took 
his  glebe  into  his  own  hands.  He  had  to  be  out  all 
day  ;  early  and  late.  He  found  he  had  to  watch  the 
laborers;  to  sit  up  all  night  with  sick  cows  and  sick 


SAMUEL  RICKARDS  AT  STOWLANGTOFT.  89 


calves  ;  to  suffer  considerable  losses  ;  make  some  mis- 
takes ;  and  finally  give  up  what  to  him  was  an  im- 
possible task. 

The  truth  is,  he  was  not  a  farmer.  In  common, 
too,  with  nearly  all  people  who  are  not  farmers,  he 
had  failed  to  realize  tliat  while  agriculture  is  a  very 
precarious  business,  it  is  the  farmer  that  takes  all  its 
fluctuations  and  uncertainties.  The  laborer  has  his 
fixed  wnges,  and  the  landlord  his  fixed  rent,  but  the 
farmer  has  to  take  his  chance  of  the  weather,  the 
markets,  casualties  of  all  kinds,  and  the  many  pests 
to  which  the  cattle  and  the  crops  are  liable. 

When  Rickards  entered  his  parsonage,  he  found 
a  large  kitchen  garden,  newly  laid  out  and  walled. 
There  were  also  shrubberies,  and  he  had  particularly 
asked  for  an  avenue  for  meditation.  But  he  also 
liked  strawberries.  There  must  be  good  beds  of 
them,  and  the  avenue  must  be  lined  with  them.  The 
crop  the  first  year  was  magnificent.  The  school  chil- 
dren were  requisitioned  to  bring  large  baskets  to  be 
filled  and  sent  to  neighbors  in  and  out  of  the  parish. 
The  next  year  the  produce  was  not  so  overpowering. 
The  third  year  there  was  hardly  any  crop  at  all. 
Rickards  had  forgotten  that  the  garden  had  been 
taken  out  of  a  wheat  field  in  the  best  bearing  con- 
dition;  and  had  now  relapsed  into  its  natural  state, 
which  was  that  usually  found  on  the  chalk. 

Like  many  other  clergymen,  Rickards  had  a  long- 
ing for  royal  roads  in  agriculture,  and  would  occa- 
sionally try  the  discoveries  announced  in  the  country 
newspapers.  Seeing  one  day  a  paragraph  stating  it 
as  a  simple  fact  that  if  you  mixed  up  an  equal  quan- 
tity of  salt,  soot,  and  sulphur,  and  spread  it  over  a 
certain  surface,  you  would  have  wonderful  crops  of 


90 


REMINISCENCES. 


everytlahig  you  might  choose  to  sow,  he  tried  it  with 
the  greatest  care,  sowing  garden  as  well  as  field  seed. 
He  waited  for  the  result  with  much  interest.  Not  a 
green  thing  appeared.  The  land  was  a  desert  and 
remained  so  for  some  years.  Rickards  believed  in 
Bishop  Berkeley's  panacea  of  tar-water.  At  least  he 
would  give  it  a  thorough  trial.  At  one  visit  I  found 
jars  of  tar-water  all  over  the  house.  Rickards  him- 
self drank  or  sipped  it  frequently  ;  sometimes  he  felt 
confident  it  did  him  good.    But  he  finally  gave  it  up. 

Even  as  a  priest  of  nature,  Rickards  had  his 
sorrows.  A  lad  in  the  school  showed  an  extraor- 
dinary turn  for  natural  histoiy,  especially  for  the 
vermin  of  water,  wood,  or  field.  Rickards  took  much 
notice  of  him,  and  finally  got  employment  for  him 
at  the  Zoological  Gardens.  He  fancied  the  reptile 
house,  and  was  put  there.  He  had  to  feed  the  crea- 
tures, and  to  change  their  arrangements.  He  was 
often  warned  of  his  rashness,  but  grew  familiar  with 
danger.  Unhappily,  coming  from  the  fresh  country 
air  to  the  reeking  metropolis,  he  acquired  the  love  of 
drink.  One  morning,  when  he  had  been  taking  too 
much,  he  had  to  deal  with  the  cobras.  One  of  them 
bit  him.  The  only  remedy  in  which  there  was  any 
faith  at  all  was  that  he  should  be  immediately  stupe- 
fied with  brandy.  But  this  required  that  he  should 
begin  sober,  and  he  was  now  in  that  stage  of  intoxica- 
tion that  did  not  admit  of  stupefaction.  He  was 
shortly  dead. 

Every  creature  had  Rickards'  sympathy  and  aid, 
ineffectual  as  it  might  sometimes  be,  for  he  could  not 
bear  to  see  anything  in  distress  without  an  effort  to 
relieve  it.  In  the  garden  of  Stowlangtoft  Hall  there 
was  an  artificial  mount,  the  top  of  which  was  reached 


SAMUEL  RICKABDS  AT  STOWLANGTOFT. 


91 


by  a  winding  path.  Arriving  at  the  top,  one  hot 
afternoon,  he  found  a  frog  that  must  have  wandered 
there  from  the  fishpond  at  the  foot  of  the  mount.  It 
had  been  some  time  out  of  its  element,  and  could 
hardly  crawl.  Rickards  stooped,  secured  it  carefully 
between  forefinger  and  thumb,  and  carrying  it  gently 
down  the  path,  threw  it  into  the  pond.  It  had 
scarcely  touched  the  water  when  a  pike  sprung  at  it 
and  swallowed  it.  "  Poor  froggy  !  "  was  all  Rickards 
could  say. 

Rickards  spoke  slowly,  for  he  never  spoke  by  rote, 
or  ran  out  in  words.  There  always  seemed  an  exact 
accord  between  heart,  head,  and  tongue.  I  can 
scarcely  imagine  anybody,  even  the  veriest  rustic, 
not  understanding  and  feeling  whatever  he  said.  His 
rebukes  must  have  been  solemn  and  awful,  except 
that  there  would  still  be  love  in  them.  Even  the 
casual  force  of  such  a  power  is  terrible.  Not  long 
after  Rickards'  arrival  at  Stowlangloft,  he  had  a  call 
from  a  neighboring  clergyman,  of  whom  he  knew 
nothing  but  his  name.  On  his  leaving,  Rickards 
offered  to  accompany  him  part  of  his  way  home. 
They  talked  of  different  people  ;  at  last  of  one  who 
had  laid  himself  open  to  censure.  It  is  the  way  of 
earnest  talkers  to  come  to  a  stand,  and  say  face  to 
face  the  most  weighty  thing  they  have  to  say.  This 
is  what  Rickards  did.  Turning  round  to  the  clergy- 
man, and  raising  his  hands  and  his  head,  he  said 
solemnly,  —  every  word  a  shot,  —  "But  what  can 
you  expect  from  a  man  that  married  his  cook  ?  "  It 
was  just  what  the  clei-gyman  himself  had  done.  He 
turned  round,  and  without  a  word  walked  away,  never 
to  come  across  Rickards  again. 

After  the  death  of  old  Mr.  Wilson,  of  Highbury 


92 


REMINISCENCES. 


Grove,  the  extensive  grounds  were  given  up  to  bricks 
and  mortar.  Henry  Wilson  named  the  cliief  thor- 
oughfare Stowlangtoft  Street.  In  a  year  or  two, 
when  in  town,  he  was  told  one  morning  that  a  deputa- 
tion had  called,  and  wished  to  see  him.  There  were 
half  a  dozen  respectable  gentlemen,  with  a  numer- 
ously signed  memorial.  It  was  a  request  that  the 
name  of  the  street  might  be  changed.  Nobody  could 
pronounce  it,  nobody  could  spell  it.  Letters  went 
wrong.  If  people  inquired  for  the  street  they  were 
not  understood.  The  street  might  as  well  have  no 
name  at  all.  There  was  no  choice,  and  Henry  Wil- 
son had  to  give  up  the  sweet  country  association. 

Lucy  Rickards,  suffering  continually  from  neural- 
gia, and  a  very  painful  disorder  of  the  gums,  found 
relief  in  work,  in  painting  and  illumination.  I  believe 
I  am  right  in  saying  that  she  gradually  filled  with 
painted  glass  every  window  in  her  father's  church. 
The  windows  were  very  large  and  very  lofty,  rising 
thirty  feet  from  the  floor  of  the  church.  But  Lucy 
Rickards  did  everything.  She  made  the  designs,  she 
cut  the  glass  that  had  to  be  cut  to  form,  she  painted 
it,  burnt  in  the  colors,  put  the  glass  together,  doing  all 
the  soldering  herself,  and  finally  she  fixed  the  com- 
plete frame  into  the  window,  requiring  no  assistance 
whatever,  except  that  a  man  had  to  be  employed  in 
the  little  scaffolding  necessary.  This  was  before  the 
days  of  the  South  Kensington  Museum,  and  she  had 
to  pay  daily  visits  for  a  long  time  to  the  British  Mu- 
seum to  copy  from  the  illuminated  works,  to  which 
she  had  access  through  Mr.  Forshall  and  Mr.  Richards 
of  Margaret  Street  Chapel. 


CHAPTER  LXXXIIL 


GEORGE  ANTHONY  DENISON. 

Most  ungrateful  would  it  be  to  pass  without  due 
honor  two  men  who  contributed  much  to  the  life  and 
brightness  of  the  common  room  in  my  time.  George 
Anthony  Denison  and  Charles  Neate  were  elected,  to- 
gether with  Trovver,  the  year  before  my  own  election, 
but  when  I  had  been  a  member  of  the  college  three 
years.  They  were  really  as  different  men  as  could 
be,  though  paired  by  force  of  circumstance,  and  to 
some  extent  of  character.  They  were  Arcades  amho. 
They  could  talk  and  chaff  about  anything,  never  at  a 
loss,  and  never  piercing  to  the  quick.  They  were 
both  good  scholars,  rather  above  the  Oxford  run. 

Denison  has  forgotten  Oriel  College.  It  is  now 
some  time  since  he  took  his  name  off  the  books.  In 
his  published  "  Reminiscences  "  he  gives  not  quite  a 
page  to  Oriel,  and  it  is  such  a  jumble  of  inaccuracies, 
absurdities,  and  apparent  forgets,  that  one  can  only 
suppose  it  an  ingenious  way  of  showing  how  little  he 
cares  for  the  college.  He  speaks  of  Senior,  Arnold, 
and  Keble  as  frequenting  Oriel  common  room,  in 
1828,  and  describes  their  conversation  as  dull  and  con- 
strained. The  fact  is  they  were  never  there,  except 
possibly  on  a  "  Gaudy  Day,"  when  Denison,  as  a  Pro- 
bationer, would  hardly  come  within  bearing  of  them. 
If  Denison  has  really  forgotten  all  about  the  college, 
what  I  have  to  say  will  be  news  to  him. 


94 


BEMIXISCEXCES. 


How  could  I  ever  forget  bis  handsome  figure,  his 
pleasant  smile,  his  musical  Yoice,  and  his  ever  ready 
wit!  Coming  from  Christchurch,  and  from  a  family 
which  had  acquired  a  good  county  position  in  Notts, 
he  had  advantages  over  most  of  us.  He  knew  the 
social  theory-  of  jjolitics,  and  a  good  deal  about  politi- 
cal men.  1  have  often  wondered  that  his  exceedingly 
able  and  interesting  prize  essay,  1829,  on  the  Power 
and  Stability  of  Federative  Governments,"  was  never 
referred  to  during  the  American  Civil  War. 

His  eldest  brother  had  just  married  a  daughter  of 
the  Duke  of  Rutland,  which  was  of  course  a  great  lift 
for  a  family  of  Leeds  clothiers.  It  opened  au  indefi- 
nite vista,  but  in  one  direction  only,  that  is,  Whig- 
gism.  Liberalism,  and  Reform.  All  the  time  I  knew 
G.  A.  D.  at  Oriel  he  was  in  harness  which  did  not  fit 
him  at  all.  The  Whig  bit  was  in  his  mouth,  and  he 
champed,  and  frothed,  and  made  play,  but  it  was  not 
his  line.  There  was  an  incessant  struggle  between 
the  inner  and  the  outer  man.  The  fire  within  had  to 
find  vent  in  something  vei-y  like  scoflBng  at  things 
generally,  and  occasionally  in  an  extraordinary  flare 
out  upon  trivial  occasions. 

At  Hall  dinner  one  day  Denison,  sitting  at  the 
head  of  the  high  table,  broke  out  into  a  sudden  rage 
at  the  rhubarb  tart  having  been  sent  up  hot  instead 
of  cold,  as  he  had  ordered,  he  said,  and  as  was  the 
uniform  custom,  he  added  in  good  society.  He  or- 
dered up  the  cook.  Mr.  King,  a  most  respectable 
man,  father  of  a  large  family,  including  a  son  at 
Magdalen  College,  came  up  and  took  his  station  at  a 
respectful  distance  to  receive  the  merited  castigation. 
Of  course  there  was  silence  in  the  hall,  dinner  was 
suspended,  and  all  listened  attentively.    Denison  ha- 


GEORGE  ANTHONY  DENISON. 


95 


rangued  the  poor  man  in  a  set  speech :  "  Was  there 
ever  such  a  barbarism  heard  of  as  serving  rhubarb 
tart  hot  ?  Where  could  Mr.  King  have  lived  to 
know  no  better  than  that?  So  he  went  on  for  ten 
minutes. 

I  felt  myself  smitten  by  these  reproaches,  for  I 
think  I  rather  sided  with  Mr.  King  in  this  momentous 
question  ;  but  I  now  saw  clearly  that  it  was  because  I 
had  not  been  in  high  society.  No  doubt  dukes  and 
that  sort  of  people  eat  their  rhubarb  tarts  cold.  In 
later  years  it  has  frequently  occurred  to  me  to  inquire 
whether  tliere  be  not  some  occult  relation  between 
hot  rhubarb  tarts  and  the  conscience  clause.  I  have 
not  found  a  clue  to  it,  so  I  hand  over  the  investiga- 
tion to  our  material  philosophers,  who  can  associ- 
ate the  highest  with  the  lowest  developments,  and 
who  may  be  able  to  construct  a  system  on  it  in  tliirty 
octavo  volumes. 

Denison  took  us  all  in  hand.  He  made  the  Fel- 
lows furnish  and  decorate  the  common  i-oom  in  good 
taste,  as  far  as  I  remember,  but  of  course  in  the  taste 
of  that  period.  In  his  laudable  desire  to  civilize  us^ 
he  introduced  aristocratic  amusements  ;  in  particular 
"cock-fighting."  Startle  not,  reader.  The  playerj 
sat  on  the  ground,  trussed  like  fowls,  facing  one 
another.  They  had  to  make  fight  with  their  toes, 
each  trying  to  trip  up  and  overthrow  his  antagonist. 
It  was  supposed  that  they  who  had  early  learnt  to 
point  their  toes  would  have  the  advantage,  but  this 
was  not  always  the  case.  Another  game,  said  to  be 
common  in  palaces,  was  done  with  broomsticks,  and 
severely  taxed  the  natural  balance  of  the  human 
frame.  It  was  about  this  time  that  ladies  had  frog 
quadrilles,  in  which  they  made  themselves  wonder- 


90 


REMINISCENCES. 


fully  like  frogs,  and  hopped  about  like  the  creatures 
in  the  fountain  of  Ceres  at  Versailles.  How  Denison 
would  have  enjoyed  to  see  that  done  in  Oriel  common 
room  !  Denison  was  one  of  the  first  body  of  mem- 
bers of  the  Athenaeum,  a  thousand,  I  think.  They 
wanted  two  hundred  more  members  to  meet  their  ex- 
penditure, and  Denison  canvassed  Oriel,  me  with  the 
rest.  As  I  expected  to  live  all  my  days  in  the  coun- 
try, I  was  not  likely,  I  thought,  to  want  a  club. 
Denison  can  hardly  have  found  the  faith  of  the 
Church  of  England  in  better  hands  at  the  Athenteum 
than  in  the  University  of  Oxford.  Has  he  renounced 
his  club  as  well  as  his  college  ? 

It  was  very  seldom  that  I  walked  into  the  Oxford 
Union.  Coming  into  the  common  room  one  evening, 
Denison  said,  in  my  hearing,  "I  have  just  heard  the 
best  speech  I  ever  heard  in  my  life,  by  Gladstone, 
against  the  Reform  Bill.  But  mark  my  woi'ds. 
That  man  will  one  day  be  a  Liberal,  for  he  argued 
against  the  Bill  on  Liberal  grounds."  No  doubt 
Denison's  own  distracted  political  state  had  qualified 
him  for  entering  into  another  man's  mental  compli- 
cations. Possessed  as  he  was  by  several  spirits,  he 
could  understand  the  inconsistent  utterances  of  one 
tormented  in  like  fashion. 

I  had  one  day  a  warm  argument  with  Denison, 
originating  in  my  applying  hai'sh  expressions  to  some 
Whig  minister  or  Whig  measure.  Denison  said  that 
motives  could  not  be  recognized  in  political  discus- 
sions, which  could  not  be  carried  on  at  all  if  they 
were.  I  maintained  that  it  was  impossible  to  ex- 
clude thein,  for  they  existed  in  fact,  and  were  actually 
inseparable.  I  should  think  we  neither  of  us  knew 
quite  what  we  were  talking  about. 


GEORGE  AXTHONY  DENISON. 


97 


I  cannot  help  thinking  that  thp  very  divided  state 
of  Denison's  convictions  upon  all  the  great  questions 
of  the  day  for  many  years,  that  is,  for  the  best  years 
of  life,  or  rather  the  difficulty  he  found  in  settling 
into  any  conviction  at  all,  operated  injuriously  on  his 
reasoning  powers.  It  was  many  years  before  he 
could  feel  himself  personally  disengaged  from  the 
family  compact,  and  quite  clear  of  it.  By  that  time 
he  bad  arrived  at  the  age  when  opinions  are  taken  in 
the  gross  and  in  their  concrete  form,  without  the 
power  of  modification. 

This  is  not  the  place  to  discuss  the  conscience 
clause,  on  the  rejection  of  which  Denison  staked  his 
name  and  himself,  body  and  soul,  it  may  almost  be 
said.  But  this  much  I  will  say :  If  that  conscience 
clause  had  been  fairly  accepted  by  the  Church  of 
England  twenty  years  since,  we  should  not  have  had 
the  Elementary  Education  Act. 

Though  it  took  Denison  a  very  long  time  to  break 
through  the  obstacles  in  the  way  of  High  Church- 
manship,  he  never  wanted  for  decision  in  action. 
When  he  was  curate  at  Cuddesdon,  and  living  in  a 
cottage  there,  he  had  occasion  for  some  turf  for  his 
garden,  and  accordingly  wrote  a  civil  note  to  the  old 
gentleman  then  possessed  of  Shotover  House,  asking 
leave  to  cut  some  turf  from  the  rough  open  ground 
at  the  top  of  the  hill.  The  answer  came  back,  "  I 
will  not  allow  anybody  to  take  turf  from  my  hill  of 
Shotover."  Without  a  minute's  delay  Denison  sent 
carts  and  horses  and  drew  as  much  turf  as  he  wanted, 
judging  rightly  that  after  so  curt  a  refusal  the  writer 
would  think  himself  and  his  turf  safe  for  some  time. 

At  Cuddesdon  Denison  was  curate  to  Saunders, 
whom  I  think  he  afterwards  succeeded,  but  tliat 

vol.  II.  7 


98 


REMINISCENCES. 


matters  not.  Saunders  —  "  Black  Saunders  "  he  was 
called,  to  distinguish  him  from  "  White  Sanders," 
now  Archdeacon  of  Exeter  —  was  a  good  scholar  and 
a  good  man.  He  became  master  of  Charterhouse 
School,  and  afterwards  Dean  of  Peterborough.  He 
was  about  the  last  man  to  take  a  leading  part  in  a 
crusade  or  a  party,  and  his  constant  companionship 
with  G.  A.  D.  is  one  of  the  many  mysteries  of  friend- 
ship. 

Denison's  fastidiousness  was  often  tried,  sometimes 
severely.  He  did  his  best  to  make  the  society  of  the 
common  room  such  as  even  a  Samuel  Wilberforce  or 
a  Lord  Dudley  could  have  walked  into  fi'esh  from  a 
West  End  drawing-room  without  offence  to  his  taste. 
But  it  was  impossible  not  to  recognize  exceptional 
abilities  and  merit,  and  these  qualities  must  be  taken 
as  we  find  them.  Poor  Denison  had  one  special 
aversion.  Wary  as  he  was,  he  had  the  extreme  im- 
prudence to  get  into  an  argument  with  Saunders  in  a 
full  common  room.  What  it  was  about,  and  what 
had  been  Denison's  last  move  I  know  not,  but  it  was 
instantly  replied  to,  loudly  and  not  very  sweetl}',  "  I 
thank  thee,  Jew,  for  teaching  me  that  word."  Though 
Denison  was,  I  think,  a  born  Tory  and  High  Church- 
man, only  doomed  to  suffer  a  long  and  cruel  bondage 
to  the  worst  of  all  tyraiinies,  family  convenience,  he 
must  be  set  down  among  the  number  of  those  upon 
whom  Newman  was  long  making  a  continual  and 
silent  impression,  undetected  or  suppressed  at  the 
time,  but  destined  to  show  itself  all  the  stronger 
afterwards. 

Everybody  must  regret  that  Denison  has  not  had 
a  larger  and  more  suitable  sphere  for  the  full  exercise 
of  his  great  powers  and  his  really  beneficent  nature. 


GEORGE  ANTHONY  DENISON. 


99 


With  his  schohirship,  his  knowledge  of  law,  his  ready 
wit,  his  promptitude  of  action,  his  agreeable  address, 
and  his  taste  for  material  improvements,  he  would 
have  made  a  first-rate  medieeval  Chancellor,  Arch- 
bishop, and  Cardinal.  Disposing  of  several  hundred 
thousand  a  year,  and  commanding  several  thousand 
men,  he  would  ere  this  have  reduced  to  convenient 
bounds  and  regular  control  the  waste  of  waters  which 
from  his  own  hills  he  sees  submerging  half  his  county. 
He  would  have  practically  solved  other  problems, 
and  set  other  examples  to  the  rest  of  England.  It  is 
stated  that  in  his  own  parish  he  has  spent  .£1,500  in 
the  formation  of  hill  reservoirs,  conduits,  and  foun- 
tains, and  in  disclosing  and  utilizing  springs.  Many 
a  clergyman  has  desired,  to  do  this,  and  has  seen  how 
it  could  be  done  ;  but  chill  penury  repressed  the  noble 
rage,  and  even  if  there  were  the  means,  there  were 
other  and  more  exigent  demands. 


CHAPTER  LXXXIV. 


CHARLES  NEATE. 

Charles  Neate  was  a  very  interesting  and  very- 
lovable  man.  I  miss  him  sadly  in  my  thoughts  of 
Oxford.  He  was  always  entertaining  and  sufficiently 
original,  for  talking  at  least.  You  felt  it  was  a  man's 
heart  before  you,  but  he  had  just  cynicism  enough  to 
sharpen  the  flavor  of  his  natural  humor  and  ready 
wit.  He  had  a  peculiar  nature,  inherited  I  believe. 
Near  forty  years  ago  I  heard  one  who  was  well  ac- 
quainted with  his  father,  and  who  had  had  dealings 
with  him,  describe  him  kindly  and  respectfully,  but 
as  a  little  —  what  shall  I  say  ?  Well,  the  word  was 
cracked.  Cracks,  crazes,  crotchets,  are  words  gener- 
ally used  to  denote  some  unexpectedly  hard  or  sharp 
resistance  in  the  composition  of  any  one  you  have  to 
deal  with.  You  expected  to  find  him  yielding  and 
elastic,  but  suddenly  you  came  on  a  bone,  perhaps 
a  backbone,  and,  in  regard  to  your  expectation  and 
plan,  it  is  a  craze.  You  may  be  right  and  you  may 
be  wrong  in  giving  an  ill  name  to  that  which  does 
not  suit  your  ends. 

Denison  and  Neate  must  have  had  much  in  com- 
mon, otherwise  they  would  not  have  got  on  so  capi- 
tally together;  but  the  differences  were  more  obvious. 
Neate  came  of  that  middle-class  gentry  that  has  acted 
so  important  a  part  in  the  maintenance  of  this  State, 
and  also  in  its  revolutions  and  lesser  perturbations. 


CHARLES  NEATE. 


101 


Keeping  their  place  pretty  well,  and  without  exorbi- 
tant ambition,  tliey  have  generally  been  frondeurs, 
content  to  grumble  at  their  little  difficulties  and  their 
want  of  openings.  They  have  coveted  the  prizes 
without  the  risks  of  public  life.  Now  and  then  they 
have  been  roused,  I'allied,  and  marshalled  by  such 
spirits  as  Cromwell,  to  this  day  the  patron  saint  of 
tl«3  class,  and  continually  invoked  to  reappear  and  do 
some  little  job  for  them.  But  it  is  very  much  of  an 
accident  what  are  their  political  opinions,  for  during 
most  of  last  century  the  class  had  Jacobite  tendencies. 
Its  rule  is  to  be  against  the  Court  party,  whatever 
that  may  be.  It  is  continually  strengthened  by  its 
alliances  with  the  town  manufacturers,  bankers,  deal- 
ers, and  brewers.  The  higher  gentry  may  possess 
much  of  the  soil  of  our  towns  and  their  neighborhood, 
but  the  smaller  gentry  have  had  the  pull  on  their 
more  valuable  industry.  Nevertheless  they  are  a 
complaining  race,  never  knowing  quite  what  to  be  at, 
as  is  the  case  with  all  half-casts. 

The  Denisons,  on  the  other  hand,  come  of  that 
robuster,  bolder,  more  independent,  and  more  ener- 
getic northern  stock  that  has  created  Lancashire  and 
the  West  Riding.  Ambitious,  and  with  a  good  deal 
of  woi'ldly  wisdom,  they  fight  their  own  battles,  in- 
stead of  harboring  their  discontents  or  venting  their 
grievances.  They  are  rich  and  have  the  gloss  of  a 
high  civilization.  They  wear  kid  gloves  and  deal 
heavy  blows ;  they  smile  as  sweet  as  lords,  but  have 
no  mercy  even  to  tlie  fallen.  G.  A.  D.  was  the  very 
type  of  the  class.  Nature  and  education  framed  him 
for  a  very  great  man,  but  he  was  robbed  of  his  career 
and  degraded  into  a  troublesome  and  unsuccessful 
agitator  by  a  grand  family  alliance,  and,  it  must  be 


102 


REMINISCENCES. 


added,  by  the  fell  necessity  of  keeping  the  electors  of 
Liverpool  drunk  for  fourteen  days  on  a  memorable 
occasion. 

With  a  genial  temperament,  a  fair  inheritance  of 
natural  gifts,  and  a  great  amount  of  goodness,  Charles 
Neate  had  an  education  specially  calculated  to  de- 
velop him  up  to  a  certain  point,  and  utterly  disqualify 
him  for  anything  beyond.  He  was  purposely  made 
hybrid,  half  an  Englishman  and  half  a  Frenchman  — 
French  to  begin  with.  His  early  education  was  at 
the  College  Bourbon  at  Paris,  where  he  obtained  a 
vei-y  great  prize  for  French  composition,  open  to  all 
the  schools  of  France.  How  that  was  it  is  hard  to 
conceive,  but  it  appears  to  have  been  the  fact.  An 
Englishman  made  half  French  can  hardly  fail  to  let 
his  political  and  social  ideas  run  in  half  a  dozen  di- 
verging directions,  for  he  can  rarely  have  so  strong 
a  predisposition  as  to  be  thoroughly  Legitimist,  or 
thoroughly  Republican,  or  thoroughly  of  any  section 
or  party.  Nor  can  he  take  things  in  a  regular 
course.  He  is  likely  enough  to  become  the  senti- 
mental adherent  of  a  party  or  a  school  existing  only 
in  the  sad  retrospect,  or  in  the  visionary  future,  or  in 
the  mere  background  of  a  picture.  Neate  lost  half 
his  English  nature,  and  acquired  only  the  fragments 
of  various  French  natures. 

It  appeared  to  me  that  he  was  always,  by  choice, 
behindhand  altogether  in  his  political  conclusions. 
There  are  people  who  are  behindhand  because  they 
are  indecisive  and  dilatory.  They  wait  to  be  led  by 
the  event,  because  they  are  simply  idle  and  slow. 
They  resolve  and  act  just  when  it  is  too  late.  But 
Neate  looked  about  him,  and  seeing  which  was  the 
side  then  quite  hopeless,  a  thing  of  the  past,  proper 


CHARLES  NEATE. 


103 


subject  for  monodies,  elegies,  and  monumental  in- 
scriptions, closed  with  it  as  best  suiting  liis  nature. 

Thus  he  early  forswore  the  worship  of  success, 
and  pinned  his  colors  to  defeat.  He  professed  to 
take  the  popular  side  of  Liberalism,  and  he  delivered 
and  published  lectures  on  Political  Economy  ;  but 
when  the  Corn  Laws  had  been  some  time  repealed, 
and  Free  Trade  was  an  established  and  stubborn 
fact,  then  he  found  out  that  it  was  all  a  mistake,  and 
England  had  been  doing  very  foolishly.  My  impres- 
sion is  that  whenever  I  met  him  I  found  him  still 
harking  back  to  some  point  of  the  almost  forgotten 
past,  or  taking  his  side  with  the  incurable  and  the 
irreversible.  He  must  have  had  a  hard  time  of  it  at 
Oxford,  except  that  it  has  latterly  yielded  him  a  con- 
tinual harvest  of  things  to  be  wished  back  again. 
One  continual  regret  he  had,  and  it  drove  him  to  the 
unwonted  exertion  of  illustrating  it  in  a  small  book. 
He  felt  the  disappearance  of  style  in  English  litera- 
ture and  public  speaking.  Writers  and  talkers  are 
so  full  of  matter,  so  hurried,  so  much  in  the  habit  of 
addressing  themselves  to  people  without  tastes  and 
ideas,  that  they  run  into  one  dull  level  of  verbiage, 
often  quite  as  empty  as  the  most  sentimental  and  im- 
aginative utterances  could  be.  So  Neate  publislied  a 
fascimlus  of  translations  into  Latin  verse  and  prose, 
and  original  compositions  in  Latin  and  French.  \n 
this  he  lets  out  rather  than  avows  his  preference  for 
the  Roraanistic  languages  to  the  Greek,  and  its  Gei- 
man  satellite.  Upon  tlie  whole,  there  can  be  little 
doubt  that  the  Latin  school  is  the  best  for  that  elo- 
quence which  is  to  please  and  persuade  as  well  as 
teach  and  inform.  Following  up  his  schoolboy  suc- 
cesses, he  had  j^wblished  in  French  a  Dialogue  be- 


104 


REMINISCENCES. 


tween  Guizot  and  Louis  Blanc  on  the  merits  of  Louis 
Philippe's  government.  From  this  he  now  appended 
extracts,  indicating  that  he  still  clave  to  that  idea  of 
constitutional  monarchy  which  somehow  has  never 
taken  root  on  French  soil. 

Keate  was  the  same  in  public  as  in  private  life. 
Strange  as  it  may  seem,  there  was  a  time  when  it  was 
hardly  possible  to  open  a  newspaper  without  seeing 
his  name  a  dozen  times  in  the  Pai-liaraentary  debates. 
He  made  good  little  speeches,  but  what  they  were 
about,  or  what  was  their  general  line,  or  whether 
they  were  on  anj  line  at  all,  it  now  passes  me  to  say. 
It  was  much  the  same  with  his  conversation,  as  far  as 
I  remember  ;  very  pleasant,  very  companionable,  very 
recreative,  good  for  heart,  mind,  and  soul,  not  over- 
taxing the  intellect  or  overcharging  the  memory.  It 
rarely  left  much  more  trace  than  the  sea  breaking 
gently  on  a  soft  shelving  shove.  Is  there  any  one 
who  can  record  Charles  Neate's  sayings  ?  They  must 
be  innumerable,  for  he  was  always  saying  something, 
and  it  was  always  something  witty,  good,  and,  in  a 
sense,  true. 

Early  in  life  he  cut  short  a  rather  promising  legal 
career  by  an  act  which  showed  his  utterly  unprac- 
tical nature.  He  was  engaged  on  the  same  side  as 
Bethell,  and  rather  in  his  usual  way  was  offering 
frequent  suggestions,  which  somewhat  disturbed  his 
leader.  In  a  moment  of  irritation  Bethell  said,  in 
the  hearing  of  the  court,  "  Hold  j'our  tongue,  you 
fool !  "  Neate  waj^laid  him  as  he  was  leaving  the 
court,  and  laid  hands  on  him  in  some  insulting  fash- 
ion. English  courts  of  law  allow  full  play  to  the 
tongue,  but  not  to  the  hands,  and  it  was  now  all  over 
with  Charles  Neate  in  his  profession. 


CHARLES  NEATE. 


105 


After  being  private  secretary  for  some  tiine  to  Sir 
F.  Baring,  when  Chancellor  of  the  Exchequer,  and 
after  representing  the  city  of  Oxford  very  respectably 
for  some  years,  Neate  devoted  himself  to  Oxford  in 
his  academic  and  also  his  municipal  character.  One 
of  his  offices  was  clerk  of  the  market,  a  post  of  some 
importance  at  Oxford,  and  of  great  antiquarian  in- 
terest. I  do  not  know  whether  in  that  capacity  he 
had  to  perform  the  ancient  duty  of  amercing  re- 
graters  and  forestallers,  but  it  would  have  suited  his 
taste  admii'ably. 

As  we  passed  through  the  market  with  him  one 
day,  everybody  gave  him  a  warm  greeting,  and  many 
had  something  to  say.  The  women  came  up  to  him 
offering  little  bouquets,  and  he  could  have  decorated 
his  "weird"  figure,  as  the  Bishop  of  Manchester 
called  it,  with  as  many  of  them  as  he  pleased.  One 
woman  was  very  importunate,  but  it  was  a  wife,  not 
a  widow,  and  a  widow  was  the  aggressor.  The  wife 
was  most  energetic  in  her  demand  for  redress,  and 
she  extracted  from  Neate  a  promise  that  he  would 
bring  her  case  before  the  next  court  of  commissioners 
—  I  think  that  was  the  phrase.  Her  husband  had  a 
shop,  with  the  use  of  the  foreshore,  that  is  the  irreg- 
ular space  between  the  foot  pavement  and  the  road. 
But  the  shop  was  at  the  corner,  and  there  was  a 
small  space  of  foreshore  not  directly  before  it.  The 
commissioners  had  allowed  a  poor  young  widow  to 
ensconce  herself  on  this  odd  bit.  But  it  was  not 
enough  for  her  little  polity  of  hampers  and  baskets, 
and  for  the  proper  display  of  her  fruits  and  vege- 
tables, so  she  had  kept  up  a  steady  encroachment 
into  the  adjacent  foreshore,  and  actually  had  estab- 
lished a  position  between  the  adjacent  shop  and  the 


106 


EEMINISCENCES. 


road.  The  aggrieved  wife  was  furious  and  implaca- 
ble. The  husband  sat  by  looking  stupidly  indiffer- 
ent.   How  it  all  ended  I  know  not. 

The  last  time  I  saw  Neate  he  was  pacing  up  and 
down  on  the  pavement  before  the  town-hall.  He 
looked  very  wild,  pale,  and  thin.  He  had  a  bundle 
of  memoranda  in  his  hand,  to  which  he  kept  look- 
ing. He  had  to  take  the  train  in  a  few  minutes  for 
town,  where  he  intended  to  make  a  speech  for  some 
nationality,  I  foi'get  what.  Its  cause  must  have  been 
utterly  hopeless  to  put  him  in  that  excitement.  I 
trust  he  was  too  late  for  the  train,  and  that  he  spent 
the  evening  with  his  sister  and  went  to  bed  in  good 
time,  for  the  meeting  was  daly  held,  and  his  name 
did  not  appear  in  the  proceedings.  Not  long  after 
that  his  virtues  were  solemnly  and  touchingly  pro- 
nounced from  the  pulpit  of  St.  Mary's,  and  the  Uni- 
versity and  the  city  followed  him  to  his  grave. 


CHAPTER  LXXXV. 

EDWARD  BLENCOWE. 

Edward  Blencowe  is  only  a  name  in  the  annals 
of  Oriel  College,  but  his  case  will  go  some  way  to 
prove  that  there  was  no  attempt  to  form  the  college 
on  any  school  or  type  of  character.  He  had  been 
with  me  at  Charterhouse,  but,  not  being  in  the  same 
house,  was  a  pleasant  acquaintance  rather  than  an 
associate.  He  went  to  that  school  at  the  age  of  ten, 
and  left  before  me.  I  was,  however,  with  him  for 
some  time  in  the  first  form,  as  it  was  there  called. 
We  were  going  through  the  Odes  of  Horace  with 
Russell's  usual  minuteness  of  criticism,  from  which 
the  attention  of  even  the  best  drilled  boys  would 
sometimes  mercifully  wander.  Blencowe  one  day 
quietly  exchanged  books  with  me,  and,  taking  out 
his  pencil,  illustrated  with  a  beautiful  coast  scene  the 
words  : 

Utcunque  dulci,  Tyndari,  fistula 
Valles,  et  Usticis  cubantis 
Levia  personuere  saxa. 

The  illustration,  however,  represented  rather  Blen- 
cowe's  own  longings  than  the  locality  named  in  the 
ode,  which  is  a  village  on  a  mountain  slope,  down 
the  valleys  of  which  rush  many  streams,  smoothing 
the  rocks  as  they  dash  over  them.  Blencowe's  pic- 
ture seemed  to  make  the  rocks  those  of  the  seashore, 
and  the  smoothing  done  by  the  waves. 


108 


REMINISCENCES. 


When  I  came  up  to  Oxford  I  found  Blencowe  had 
been  some  time  scholar  of  Wadham,  and  we  renewed 
our  friendship.  He  lived,  however,  veiy  much  in  a 
little  world  of  his  own.  He  took  a  first  class  at  Easter, 
1828,  and  when  I  became  Fellow  I  saw  still  more  of 
him,  but  with  my  notion  of  Wadham  he  seemed  to 
me  lost  in  that  college.  It  was  at  least  a  separation. 
So  I  persuaded  him  to  stand  for  Oriel,  and  spoke 
much  of  his  merits  to  Newman,  Froude,  and  Wilber- 
force.  He  was  elected.  It  was  an  utter  failure. 
Blencowe  divided  his  time  between  his  new  and  his 
old  college,  and  had  all  his  heart  in  the  old  one.  This 
would  not  necessarily  imply  any  distaste  for  his  new 
companions.  Wadham  College  is  far  superior  to 
Oriel  in  its  buildings,  its  garden,  and  even  its  situa- 
tion, though  a  little  out  of  the  way.  But,  in  matter 
of  fact,  BlencoAve  did  not  feel  at  home  in  Oriel  so- 
ciety, and  did  not  even  make  the  attempt.  I  soon, 
and  for  some  time,  got  a  good  deal  twitted  on  the  ill 
success  of  my  I'ecommendations.  How  anybody  could 
cleave  in  his  heart  to  Symons  is  a  thing  I  cannot 
understand,  but  when  one  sees  the  husbands  some 
wives  are  found  to  dote  upon,  one  cannot  be  surprised 
at  anything. 

Blencowe  gave  up  residence  as  soon  as  he  could, 
took  Orders,  and  had  charge  of  a  parish  some  years 
on  the  coast  of  Glamorganshire.  I  had,  and  still 
possess,  many  letters  from  him.  They  abounded  in 
descriptions  of  the  Mumbles,  reminding  me  often  of 
his  Horatian  vignette,  and  they  told  me  much  I  had 
not  known  of  the  Flemish  settlement  of  the  Gower. 
Blencowe  married,  and  till  his  death,  at  the  age  of 
thirty-eight,  had  the  curacy  of  Teversali,  in  Notts. 
His   widow  published  a  volume  of  his  sermons. 


EDWARD  BLENCOWE. 


109 


wi'itten  without  a  thought  of  publication  ;  and  upon 
the  great  encouragement  she  received  she  published 
a  second  and  then  a  third  volume.  For  all  I  know, 
these  sermons  have  been  preached  from  more  pulpits 
than  any  other  sermons  of  this  century,  and  they 
certainly  bear  much  preaching.  None  could  be 
simpler,  plainer,  more  earnest,  or  more  kindly.  Well, 
I  suppose  I  must  set  him  down  as  a  feather  in  old 
Syraons'  cap,  much  as  I  grudge  him  that  ornament. 
The  sermons,  however,  are  described  as  by  the  late 
Rev.  Edward  Blencowe,  formerly  Fellow  of  Oriel 
College. 


CHAPTER  LXXXVL 


CHARLES  PORTALIS  GOLIGHTLY. 

In  any  picture  of  Oriel  society,  as  bearing  on 
the  "movement,"  there  are  other  characters  than 
those  already  noticed  that  would  be  certainly  looked 
for.  What  shall  be  said  of  the  most  unchangeable 
member  of  Oriel,  not  to  say  Oxford  society;  the 
iron  bridge  striding  right  over  the  movement,  and 
stretching  from  the  Oriel  school  of  Coplestone's  days 
to  who  shall  say  what  new  Oriel  school  of  the  latter 
days  of  this  changeful  century? 

Oriel  men  of  almost  any  standing  will  anticipate 
who  this  must  be.  Golightly  came  to  Oriel  with 
some  great  advantages.  He  was  an  Etonian,  and 
was  thus  known,  and  a  public  character,'  from  his 
boyhood.  His  friends,  moving  about,  had  lived  in 
various  pleasant  places,  forming  many  acquaintances. 
He  had  been  some  time  at  Rome,  seeing  a  good  deal 
of  certain  Cardinals,  and  entering  into  their  charac- 
ters and  their  politics.  One  result  was  a  lurking 
tenderness  for  Cardinals,  and  Golightly  was  not  a 
little  pleased  to  find  some  years  ago  that  his  house 
stood  in  the  old  books  of  Merton  College  as  the 
Cardinal's  Head.  He  had  a  pretty  little  Cardinal's 
hat  painted  on  the  lintel  of  his  front  door.  No  doubt 
he  has  felt  it  an  honor  to  his  University  to  have 
contributed  two  living  members  of  the  Sacred 
College. 


CHARLES  PORTALIS  GOLIGHTLY. 


Ill 


Goligbtly's  second  Christian  name  indicates  his 
descent  from  a  Protestant  branch  of  the  very  numer- 
ous Portalis  family,  which,  variously  spelt,  has  per- 
formed distinguished  parts  in  French  and  Swiss 
politics,  and  has  a  good  position  in  this  country. 
Golightly  used  to  produce  some  interesting  family 
relics  and  traditions  of  the  French  prophets,  who 
about  the  beginning  of  last  century  anticipated  clair- 
voyance, spiritual  mediums,  and  all  the  rest  of  it, 
lately  much  in  vogue  and  not  quite  exploded  yet. 

He  had  early  formed  strong  religious  convictions. 
An  early  formation  of  chai-acter  brings  its  advantages 
and  also  its  disadvantages.  Society  has  the  benefit  of 
both.  I  have  to  acknowledge  the  greatest  of  obliga- 
tions. Golightly  was  the  first  human  being  to  talk 
to  me,  directly  and  plainly,  for  my  soul's  good,  and 
that  is  a  debt  that  no  time,  no  distance,  no  vicissi- 
tudes, no  differences  can  elface,  no  not  eternity  itself, 
if  one  may  venture  to  name  that  which  is  incom- 
prehensible. His  religion  was  that  of  Scott,  and 
Newton,  and  Cecil,  and  Baxter,  and  Owen,  and  cer- 
tain select  Puritans,  not  without  a  little  High  Church 
seasoning,  when  not  quite  too  high. 

He  had  abundance  of  means,  of  general  informa- 
tion and  anecdote,  and  of  self-confidence,  invaluable 
at  a  University.  Most  freshmen  are  so  overwhelmed 
by  the  new  world  they  are  brought  into,  and  the 
bright  vision  opened  to  their  eyes,  that  they  spend 
sevei'al  terms  in  recovering  self-possession  and  learn- 
ing to  feel  at  home.  They  are  leaning  upon  old  school 
acquaintances,  timidly  courting  new  ones,  nervous 
about  etiquette,  suspicious  of  the  outer  world,  and 
sometimes  even  beginning  to  wrap  themselves  up  in 
a  sullen  independence.    Golightly  must  have  been  as 


112 


KEfflNISCENCES, 


much  at  home  and  master  of  a  certain  position  the 
day  he  arrived  at  Oxford,  fifty-eight  years  ago,  as  he 
is  to-day. 

He  was  always  accessible,  companionable,  and 
hospitable,  and  his  own  kindness  and  frankness  were 
diffused  among  those  that  met  in  his  rooms  and 
made  a  social  circle.  He  could  criticise  the  Univer- 
sity sermons  freely,  raise  theological  questions,  and 
occasionally  lay  down  the  law,  —  a  very  useful  thing 
to  be  done  in  the  mass  of  wild  sentiment,  random 
utterances,  and  general  feeling  of  irresponsibility  con- 
stituting undergraduate  conversation.  At  a  very 
early  period  his  decision  upon  Newman  was  that  he 
wanted  judgment.  Of  bis  genius  he  doubted  not,  but 
he  felt  that  to  be  a  dangerous  element  in  the  Church. 

I  used  to  meet  good  men  of  other  colleges  at  Go- 
lightly's  rooms,  and  I  am  under  a  great  though  in- 
definite obligation  to  him  on  that  account.  But  the 
truth  is,  v^hen  people  are  good,  but  all  in  much  the 
same  way,  and  in  the  same  phrases,  a  few  types  are 
all  that  the  memory'  will  carry  long.  I  retain  and 
love  the  memory  of  Salisbury  Everard.  The  last 
time  I  met  him  was  at  Golightly's  rooms,  when  I 
was  on  the  point  of  taking  Orders.  His  farewell 
words  to  me  were,  "  I  hope  that  when  your  people  ask 
for  bi"ead,  you  will  not  give  them  a  stone."  The 
words  have  recurred  to  me  ten  thousand  times,  not 
without  a  misgiving  that  I  was  doing  the  very  thing 
deprecated.  I  have  given  my  successive  parishioners 
plenty  of  stone,  in  church  building,  school  building, 
and  church  and  village  improvements.  In  that  and 
other  ways  I  have  given  plenty  of  the  bread  that 
perisheth.  As  to  that  other  bread,  who  will  be  bold 
to  answer  for  himself  ? 


CHARLES  POBTALIS  GOLIGHTLY.  113 


Upon  taking  his  degree,  and  being  told  that  his 
private  income  would  disqualify  him  for  a  Fellowship, 
Golightly  was  ordained,  and  held  curacies  at  Godal- 
ming  and  elsewhere,  acquiring  varied  experiences  of 
Evangelical  incumbents,  I  fear  I  should  spoil  some  of 
his  stories  if  I  were  to  try  to  repeat  them.  Where 
was  it  that  he  took  the  sole  charge  of  a  large  parish, 
the  Evangelical  incumbent  of  which  was  to  be  absent 
for  two  years  on  a  continental  tour  ?  He  had  imme- 
diately to  start  down  the  gutter  a  large  stock  of  small 
beer  he  had  had  to  pay  for.  The  Vicar  had  left  a 
servant  in  the  house  to  take  care  not  only  of  it,  but 
also  of  his  own  babe  in  arms ;  and  had  very  thought- 
fully left  minute  directions  what  was  to  be  done  with 
the  hapless  innocent  in  case  it  caught  the  small-pox, 
and  where  it  was  to  be  buried  if  it  died. 

In  1836,  when  Littlemore  chapel  was  nearly  fin- 
ished, it  occurred  to  me  and  some  others  that  it  would 
be  a  very  nice  arrangement  for  Golightly  to  return  to 
Oxford  and  take  the  charge  of  the  chapel  and  district, 
which  then  had  no  endowment.  Of  course  we  ought 
to  have  thought  a  little  more  about  his  theological 
views,  and  his  rather  determined  expression  of  them. 
Golightly  entered  into  the  plan  with  real  enthusiasm, 
bought  a  good  house  in  Holywell  Street,  and  settled 
there.  A  single  sermon  dispelled  the  pleasant  illusion. 
It  was  evidently  impossible  that  he  and  the  Vicar  of 
St.  Mary's  could  get  on  together.  So  there  was  Go- 
lightly cajoled,  betrayed,  and  cast  adrift.  It  was  a 
case  of  downright  folly  all  round. 

But  many  a  wise,  carefully  considered,  and  well 
digested  scheme  has  led  to  less  permanent  and  less 
important  results.  Golightly  was  satisfied  with  his 
position.   He  had  a  constant  succL'ssion  of  new  under- 

VOL.  II.  8 


114 


REMINISCENCES. 


gi'aduate  friends,  including  Frederick  Faber  and 
others,  afterwards  distinguished  as  members  of  the 
new  school.  He  added  to  his  house  and  his  gardens, 
and  became  a  considerable  personage,  exercising  in 
due  time  a  quasi-patriarchal  jurisdiction  over  the 
University  and  the  Diocese  of  Oxford,  and  the  Church 
of  England.  But  while  all  is  change  around  him,  and 
nowhere  is  change  so  rapid  and  so  revolutionary  as  at 
Oxford,  Golightly  has  remained  as  fixed  as  the  rock 
against  which  Virgil  describes  the  winds  and  waves 
beating  in  vain.  Generations  of  undergraduates,  of 
tutors,  and  even  of  heads  of  houses,  have  passed  by 
him,  and  he  remains.  Oaths,  subscriptions,  clerical 
Fellows,  lay  Fellows,  tutors,  halls,  have  passed  away, 
but  Golightly  still  lives  to  tell  of  Oxford,  and  of 
Rome  too,  as  they  were  in  the  first  quarter  of  this 
century. 

Ordinary  natures  might  succumb  under  the  sense 
of  an  ineffectual  struggle  against  the  law  of  change, 
not  to  say  deterioration.  Fortunately,  a  fact  so 
painful  and  depressing  seems  almost  out  of  Golightly's 
ken,  or  it  has  operated  like  a  tonic  on  his  healthy 
physical  and  moral  constitution.  He  has  fulfilled 
the  particular  duty  impressed  on  the  tender  con- 
science of  his  infancy,  protesting  against  everything 
that  in  his  judgment  savors  of  superstition  and 
sacerdotalism.  The  Power  that  allots  us  our  several 
parts  has  given  him  that  to  do,  so  he  believed,  and  so 
he  has  done.  Let  others  find  their  work  in  other 
lines. 

Since  the  above  was  written,  Golightly  has  pub- 
lished an  indignant  but  not  the  less  interesting 
Letter  on  many  passages  reflecting  on  himself  in  the 
second  volume  of  the  "  Life  of  Bishop  Wilberforce." 


CHARLES  PORTALIS  GOLIGHTLY. 


115 


The  editor  of  that  Life  has  committed  an  offence, 
amounting  to  a  positive  outrage,  against  the  common 
rules  of  obituary  record.  The  first  of  those  rules  is 
not  to  say  anything  but  good  of  the  newly  departed. 
Their  virtues  are  to  be  brought  out,  their  good  deeds 
told,  all  the  rest  softened,  and  even  veiled.  The 
second  rule  is  a  corollary.  It  is  that  the  opportunity 
is  not  to  be  used  to  rake  up  controversies,  to  fling 
stones  right  and  left,  or  to  vamp  up  an  ideal  per- 
fection by  depreciating  and  satirizing  others  all 
round  ;  in  a  word,  to  convert  what  really  is  a  pious 
service  into  a  vulgar  broil.  This  second  rule  must 
be  observed,  or  the  biographer  will  find  the  rule 
De  mortuis  nil  nisi  bonum  very  soon  disregarded. 
Golightly,  with  most  other  people,  was  evidently 
willing  to  merge  old  feuds  and  long  reckonings  in 
the  more  agreeable  sentiment  of  a  loving  admiration 
for  Samuel  Wilberforce's  genial  nature  and  many 
useful  qualities.  But  he  was  not  allowed  to  do  this. 
The  biographer  as  it  were  diverted  the  funeral  train 
from  its  proper  course  that  the  mourners  might 
break  Golightly's  windows  as  they  passed.  Of  course 
he  has  resented  this  abuse  of  a  sacred  solemnity,  and 
stood  on  his  defence.  So  far  as  I  have  read  he  has 
not  said  a  word  that  is  not  justified  by  the  occasion, 
though  for  one  I  much  regret  that  the  occasion  has 
occurred. 


CHAPTER  LXXXVII. 


CHAKLES  LAKCELOT  LEE  BKENTON. 

Brenton  supplies  but  a  fleeting  image  and  a  sad 
retrospect.  He  was  the  very  child  of  misfortune 
and  hardship.  His  ancestors  had  been  loyal  to  the 
British  cause  in  the  American  War  of  Independence, 
and' had  lost  all  their  property,  which  was  consider- 
able. His  father  had  become  celebrated  as  captain 
of  the  Spartan  frigate,  that  by  continually  keeping 
just  ahead  of  the  French  fleet  in  the  Mediterranean 
warned  British  vessels  of  its  approach.  He  was 
rewarded  with  a  baronetcy,  but  not  with  the  means 
to  support  it.  The  general  notion  in  those  days  was 
that  if  a  man  had  a  title  he  could  take  it  to  market 
and  buy  a  fortune  with  it.  Brenton's  uncle  wrote,  or 
compiled,  a  copious  history  of  our  naval  wars,  de- 
signed to  supersede  that  by  James,  and  he  fondly 
•hoped  that  the  nephew  at  Oriel  would  one  day  devote 
himself  to  prepare  it  for  the  press. 

The  family  were  in  straitened  circumstances.  Bren- 
ton,  it  was  said,  came  up  with  an  allowance  of  £150 
a  3'ear  to  cover  all  expenses.  It  can  be  done,  but 
only  as  Brenton  did  it.  As  far  as  appearances  went 
be  raifiht  have  worn  the  same  clothes  all  the  time  he 
was  at  college,  and  his  rooms  were  not  inviting.  But 
there  was  something  like  a  quarrel  with  the  world  in 
Brenton's  disposition.  In  one  way  or  another  he  had 
suffered  persecution,  but  had  not  learnt  mercy,  for  he 


CHARLES  LANCELOT  LEE  BRENTON. 


117 


had  but  scant  share  of  the  graces  that  sweeten  life 
and  reconcile  men.  He  had  hardly  a  good  word  for 
anybody,  least  of  all  for  the  tutors  and  college  offi- 
cers, sorely  taxed  and  sorely  vexed,  and  yet  doing 
their  best  to  accomplish  their  arduous  and  not  very 
thankful  duties  ;  at  all  events  vastly  his  superiors. 
There  was  a  harshness  and  cynicism  about  him  which 
did  small  honor  to  his  religious  professions. 

A  ready  sympathy  with  the  many  various  forms  of 
goodness  and  of  greatness  checkering  the  landscape 
of  this  world  even  to  the  very  foreground  is  a  con- 
stant source  of  happiness  to  draw  upon  in  dull  or  sor- 
rowful times.  It  is  good  to  love  and  admire  as  much 
as  possible  ;  deadly  to  love  and  admire  none.  Sym- 
pathy, too,  is  tlie  chief  outwork  of  truth  and  duty, 
for  we  naturally  think  longer  and  deeper  over  a  mat- 
ter when  the  heart  is  interested. 

Brenton  was  always  ready  to  take  the  chair  of  au- 
thority and  deliver  the  law.  Of  course  he  was  an 
early  riser,  and  in  this  matter  he  regarded  the  com- 
fort of  his  neighbors  as  little  as  he  did  his  own.  His 
rooms  were  a  couple  of  stories  over  Tyler's.  "  Mr. 
Brenton,"  said  the  Dean  one  day,  with  kindly  expos- 
tulation, "  what  is  that  I  hear  every  morning  about 
five  o'clock  come  down  with  a  thump  over  ray  head  ?  " 
Brenton  had  adopted  the  hideous  device  by  which  a 
great  weight  is  released  at  the  appointed  hour  and 
drags  off  your  bed-clothes.  It  had  hardly  occurred  to 
him  that  he  was  waking  the  whole  staircase  at  the 
same  time. 

There  was  a  presentiment  of  unhappiness  when  he 
left  the  college,  for  he  carried  a  gloom  with  him.  He 
took  Orders,  and  in  a  year  or  two  it  was  rumored 
that  he  had  been  overworked  with  the  care  of  a  large 


118 


REMINISCENCES. 


parish,  and  that  he  lay  ill  of  a  bad  fever.  After  a 
time  he  was  reported  well  again,  but  unable  to  take 
duty.  He  presented  himself  at  the  college,  and  of 
coui'se  was  invited  to  the  common  room.  It  was  im- 
mediately evident  that  he  was  not  quite  recovered  of 
his  fever,  and  that  Oxford  was  not  the  place  to  com- 
plete his  recovery.  He  took  the  lead  of  the  conver- 
sation, and  conducted  arguments  in  a  voice  that  shook 
the  building.  In  vain  did  the  other  talkers  lower 
and  soften  their  tones  to  set  the  key ;  he  only  vocif- 
erated louder  and  louder. 

This  was  startling  in  a  man  who  had  been  an  un- 
dergraduate a  few  months  before.  But  this  was  one 
of  the  institutions  of  the  period,  at  least  of  the  school 
to  which  Brenton  had  attached  himself.  The  great 
and  good  man  of  that  school  had  a  message  to  deliver 
and  an  opportunity  to  use.  He  could  not  do  this 
without  silencing  common  voices  and  stopping  frivo- 
lous conversation.  I  remember  Cunningham  of  Har- 
row, at  an  unusually  large  party  in  the  common 
room,  seated  near  one  end  of  the  room.  At  the  first 
pause  he  raised  his  voice  and  addressed  himself  to 
some  one  at  the  other  end,  and  delivered  a  series  of 
addresses  in  a  key  which  scarcely  allowed  of  inter- 
ruption or  response.  Mrs.  Archdeacon  Robinson, 
Dornford's  sister,  did  the  same,  so  I  heard,  for  I  was 
not  present  at  the  Pi-ovost's  table.  In  the  country  I 
not  unfrequently  found  myself  at  parties  where  the 
understanding  was  that  after  a  five  minutes'  inter- 
change of  greetings,  conversation  was  to  falter,  and 
the  big  gun  to  open  fire. 

It  was  a  great  relief,  though  with  some  misgiving 
for  the  results,  when  it  was  known  that  Brenton 
had  taken  charge'of  Stadhampton,  seven  miles  from 


CHARLES  LANCELOT  LEE  BRENTON. 


119 


Oxford,  in  the  temporary  absence  of  Mr.  Peers,  it 
might  be  for  a  couple  of  months.  Before  the  expira- 
tion of  that  time  it  was  rumored  that  he  had  refused 
to  bury  a  drunkard,  and  that  he  had  preached  a  vio- 
lent sermon,  declaring  liis  intention  to  quit  the 
Church  of  England.  He  might  soon  be  expected 
back  at  Oxford.  He  came,  and  he  published  his  ser- 
mon. 

In  reply  to  the  anxious  inquiries  of  his  old  friends, 
he  gave  some  curious  explanations  of  his  conduct. 
*  He  had  long  had  his  doubts  about  the  Church  of  Eng- 
land. It  was  only  a  sort  of  Popery.  A  man  was  not 
the  better  for  belonging  to  it.  He  had  taken  a  pop- 
ulous parish  in  order  to  stifle  these  doubts  in  incessant 
work.  The  struggle  between  working  and  doubting 
had  cost  him  his  health  and  nearly  his  life.  He  had 
already  made  up  his  mind  to  leave  the  Church  when, 
after  his  illness,  he  returned  to  Oxford,  but  had 
thought  it  his  duty  to  hear  what  the  college  had  to 
say  in  defence  of  the  Church.  The  college  had  said 
nothing  to  alter  his  intention.  In  point  of  fact  he  had 
not  allowed  the  college  to  say  anything,  for  wherever 
he  was  he  talked  and  would  let  nobody  else  talk.  He 
had  thereupon  wanted  an  opportunity  to  renounce 
the  Church,  and  a  clergyman  off  duty  has  no  oppor- 
tunity. So  he  gladly  availed  himself  of  Mr.  Peers' 
offer  to  take  charge  of  his  parish,  as  it  would  be  sure 
speedily  to  supply  him  with  the  desired  occasion. 
The  death  of  the  drunkard  was  all  that  he  wanted, 
and  on  that  text  he  had  preached  and  acted.  It  did 
not  occur  to  him  for  a  moment  that  there  was  some 
dishonesty  and  hypocrisy  in  undertaking  a  solemn 
charge,  on  the  plain  understanding  that  he  would  ac- 
cept the  ordinary  conditions  of  the  work,  but  with  a 


120 


REMINISCENCES. 


secret  intention  to  throw  np  the  engagement  and 
leave  his  friend  in  the  lurch,  as  tlie  readiest  way  of 
protesting  against  these  ordinary  conditions. 

Indeed,  it  was  evident  the  poor  man  was  mad  when 
he  came  back  to  college,  and  was  mad  even  now. 
While  Brenton  was  still  rushing  about  Oxford  in  an 
excited  state,  I  was  under  examination  for  Deacon's 
Orders.  The  day  before  the  ordination  I  had  re- 
ceived the  usual  suggestion  to  supply  m3^self  with  a 
copy  of  the  Ordination  Service,  published  separately 
in  square  black  covei's.  Coming  out  of  Parker's  shop 
with  one  of  these  in  my  hand,  1  met  Brenton  striding 
along.  He  was  familiar  with  the  look  of  the  book. 
"  So  3'ou  're  going  in  just  as  I 'm  going  out,"  he  hal- 
loed at  the  pitch  of  his  voice,  and  passed  on  without 
a  word  more. 

Before  long  it  was  known  that  Brenton  and  some 
equally  distempered  friend  had  taken  a  small  chapel 
at  Bath,  and  set  up  a  new  sect,  of  no  very  peculiar 
or  distinctive  character.  At  intervals  I  and  his  other 
old  Oxford  acquaintances  received  from  him  English 
and  Latin  verses  of  a  sentimental  character,  not  with- 
out merit,  but  affording  no  cue  to  the  separation. 
The  congregation  was  said  to  be  small  and  intermit- 
tent, and  the  sect  appears  to  have  died  out  with  the 
founders. 

It  was  in  December,  1831,  that  Brenton  seceded 
from  the  Church  of  England,  one  of  many  fugitives 
upon  one  ground  or  another. 

The  unfortunate  officer  who  left  the  Prince  Impe- 
rial to  his  fate  was  a  blood  relation,  a  nephew  ;  and 
it  has  occurred  to  me  that  a  touch  of  insanity  is  the 
best  account  that  can  be  given  of  his  extraordinary 
behavior  in  that  lamentable  affair. 


CHARLES  LANCELOT  LEE  BRENTON. 


121 


Poor  Brenton's  interruption  of  Tyler's  "  beauty's 
sleep "  reminds  me  of  my  having  once  been  the 
means  of  shortening  his  rest  at  the  other  end.  I  was 
occupying  the  garret  at  the  top  of  the  buttery  stair- 
case. Danvers  Clarke,  whom  I  had  known  as  a  pu- 
pil of  Mi:  Wayland  in  Lincolnshire,  and  who  was 
now  at  Exeter  College,  dropped  in  to  tea.  Towards 
eleven  he  observed  a  small  door  in  the  wainscot. 
"What's  that  ?  "  he  said.  It  was  the  door  to  the  bell 
turret.  Opening  it,  he  sprung  into  the  turret,  and 
mounting  a  few  steps,  laid  hold  of  the  rope  and  rang 
the  bell  several  times.  It  is  about  the  most  alarming 
sound  that  can  be  heard  at  Oxford,  for  if  it  means 
anything  it  is  a  college  on  fire.  The  porter  was  up 
immediately,  and  had  to  go  and  report  to  the  Dean. 
Next  morning  Tyler  sent  for  me. 

"  Mr.  Mozley,  I  was  just  falling  aslee,)  last  night 
when  I  heard  the  bell.  I  could  not  suppose  it  was 
you  ringing  it,  and  could  not  think  what  had  hap- 
pened." 

I  explained,  and  was  advised  to  be  careful  in  the 
choice  of  acquaintance. 

The  prospect  of  editing  his  uncle's  "  Naval  His- 
tory "  was  an  incubus  that  weighed  heavily  on  poor 
Brenton.  There  was  an  immense  mass  of  MSS.  to 
be  arranged,  reduced  to  convenient  bulk,  and  a  good 
deal  rewritten.  Tlie  details  were  new  to  Brenton. 
He  left  me  in  doubt  whether  he  was  likely  to  under- 
take it,  but  I  understood  that  the  uncle  had  sent  him 
to  school  and  college  for  the  purpose.  The  idea  of  a 
big  work  to  be  done  must  have  become  fixed  in  his 
mind,  for  on  the  last  page  of  a  small  collection  of 
pieces  he  sent  me  in  1858,  I  see  among  other  publi- 
cations by  Sir  C.  Brenton,  "  The  Septuagint  Version 


122 


REMINISCENCES. 


of  the  Old  Testament,  according  to  the  Vatican  text, 
ti'anslated  into  English,  with  the  principal  various 
readings  of  the  Alexandrine  copy,  and  a  Table  of 
Comparative  Chronology.  Bagster,  Paternoster  Row. 
Price  one  guinea." 


CHAPTER  LXXXVIII. 


ANTOZSTY  BULLEK. 

Devonshiee  was  strong  at  Oriel  in  these  days,  for 
Coplestone  was  proud  of  his  county  and  of  his  line- 
age, and  he  used  to  acquaint  everybody  with  the  an- 
tiquities of  his  own  family  and  the  origin  of  his 
name.  Among  the  most  genuine  sons  of  Devon  was 
"  Tony  BuUer,"  then  a  very  unpretending  and.  very 
warm-hearted  friend  of  the  Froudes.  He  was  rather 
disposed  to  hide  his  talent  under  a  bushel,  a  common 
fault  of  good  men,  but  a  fault  for  all  that. 

In  his  very  first  term  'he  had  an  unlucky  mishap. 
He  was  asked  to  a  supper,  and  having  no  excuse  for 
declining,  he  felt  himself  bound  to  go.  The  company 
smoked  and  drank,  talked  and  sang  songs  louder  and 
louder,  as  is  the  way  of  such  people,  tliinking  of  no- 
body but  themselves.  Poor  Tony  felt  crushed  and 
humiliated;  he  could  not  open  his  mouth,  and  had 
not  the  courage  to  rise  from  his  chair  and  bid  his 
friends  good-night.  It  might  be  bad  manners  to 
break  up  so  pleasant  a  party.  Towards  midnight 
the  door  opened  and  Hawkins,  now  Provost,  pre- 
sented himself  in  his  academicals.  As  he  was  look- 
ing round  for  some  one  whom  he  might  hope  to  find 
sensible  of  his  rebuke,  his  eye  lighted  on  Tony  Bul- 
ler,  the  picture  of  misery,  though  the  Provost  might 
easily  put  another  construction  on  the  blank  exprea- 
Bion  of  his  face.    "  Mr.  BuUer,"  he  immediately  be- 


124 


REMINISCENCES.- 


gaii,  "  I  am  astonished  to  see  you,"  etc.,  etc.  He 
said  wliatever  might  be  properly  addressed  to  a 
young  country  gentleman  suddenly  revealing  himself 
as  a  monster  of  juvenile  depravity. 

Buller  told  his  story  the  next  morning  to  Froude 
and  R.  Wilberforce,  to  their  infinite  amusement. 
During  the  whole  of  BuUer's  undergraduateship, 
whenever  he  presented  himself  in  the  Tower,  at  the 
end  of  term,  for  the  "  Collections,"  or  terminal  exam- 
ination, the  Provost  invariably  began,  "  Mr.  Buller,  I 
hope  you 've  not  been  again  guilty  of  those  disorderly 
proceedings  in  which  I  found  you  engaged  so  soon 
after  becoming  member  of  the  college,"  etc.,  etc. 

The  tutors  were  always  prepared  for  the  scene, 
and  two  of  them,  sitting  a  little  further  back  than 
the  Provost,  exchanged  glances  with  poor  Tony  as 
he  sat,  the  very  picture  of  guilt,  receiving  his  period- 
ical castigation.  I  think  it  not  unlikely  that  were 
poor  Tony  to  find  himself  in  the  presence  of  the  Pro- 
vost to-morrow  he  would  look  as  guilty  as  ever. 

So  I  wrote ;  but  since  I  wrote  it  I  see  that  the 
Antony  Buller,  the  simple  child  I  remember  at  col- 
lege, and  who  was  still  as  simple  as  a  child  when  I 
last  saw  him  on  a  visit  to  his  aunt,  Mrs.  Clive,  of 
Barkham,  in  Berkshire,  has  passed  away  at  the  age 
of  seventy-one.  He  preached  and  published  various 
occasional  sermons  that  were  thoughtful,  learned,  and 
interesting,  Four  of  these,  in  a  series,  were  on  the 
Constitution  of  the  Church,  and  Church  Authority, 
as  well  as  I  can  remember,  though,  after  much 
searching,  I  cannot  lay  my  hand  on  them. 


CHAPTER  LXXXIX. 


WILLIAM  HEBERDEN  KABSLAKE. 

William  Heberden  Karslake  I  remember  an 
inoffensive  little  fellow  at  Cliai'terliouse,  with  a  round 
brown  face,  in  a  very  quiet  little  circle,  holding  his 
own,  a  little  gentleman,  and  to  be  respected.  Even 
then,  at  twelve  or  thereabout,  he  looked  prematurely 
wise.  He  followed  me  to  Oriel,  and  there  found  him- 
self in  a  very  lively  circle,  containing  some  Devon- 
shire men  who  think  much  of  the  name  of  Karslake. 
They  must  have  been  attracted,  too,  by  the  grave 
simplicity  of  his  expression.  With  him  there  came 
to  Oriel  several  Charterhouse  friends,  among  whom 
were  the  two  very  good  sons  of  Mr.  Joseph  Parker, 
of  Oxford. 

William  Froude,  perhaps  Hurrell  himself  occasion- 
ally, Henry  Wilberforce,  John  Dorney  Harding,  John 
Marriott,  Wilson,  George  Ryder,  and  others,  would 
set  at  him  and  torture  him  to  extract  distincter  and 
more  decisive  opinions  on  the  great  questions  of  the 
day  than  suited  his  disposition.  No  doubt  more  than 
once  or  twice  he  heard  "  Under  which  king  ?  Bezo- 
nian,  speak  or  die."  After  much  baiting  he  would 
take  refuge  in  the  old  conclusion  that  there  is  much 
to  be  said  on  both  sides.  He  had  often  occasion  to 
do  this,  and  of  course  got  nicknamed  Sir  Roger  de 
Coverley.  He  spoke  slowly  and  in  set  forms.  "  Are 
you  partial  to  beef,  ma'am  ?  "  he  said  to  the  Provost's 


126 


EEMINISCENCES. 


lady,  as  he  sat  by  me  at  one  of  the  Provost's  dinner 
parties.  I  was  rather  tickled  by  the  expression,  but 
long  after  found  it  not  unusual  in  Devonshire. 

When  I  went  there  in  1868  I  found  Karslake,  now 
Rector  of  Meshaw,  a  very  considerable  personage. 
Chairman  of  Quarter  Sessions,  Vice-chairman  of  the 
Board  of  Guardians,  great  in  committees  and  public 
business,  enjoying  everybody's  confidence,  besides  be- 
ing a  hunting,  shooting,  and  yachting  man,  Rui"al 
Dean,  and  soon  after  a  Prebendary.  About  ten  years 
ago  Parliament  provided  for  him  a  subject  peculiarly 
fitted  for  him,  in  the  Dihipidations  Act.  It  brought 
before  the  clergy  their  responsibilities  in  that  matter 
much  more  distinctly  and  urgetitly  than  they  were 
quite  prepared  for.  But  it  seemed  to  put  them  in  a 
vise,  at  the  mercy  of  a  surveyor,  who  was  to  visit  on 
various  occasions,  give  orders,  demand  raonej'',  and 
exact  fees.  The  l  ural  clergy  get  very  few  fees,  and 
don't  like  paying  them.  Nor  do  they  like  lay  officials 
over  their  heads,  or  red  tape  as  they  call  it.  Many 
hardly  seemed  to  be  aware  that  the  old  law  of  dilap- 
idation was  very  precarious,  and  often  very  severe  in 
its  incidence  and  working. 

Karslake,  whose  own  preferment  was  of  trifling 
value,  and  whose  partrimony  was  but  moderate,  took 
up  the  cause  of  the  oppressed,  and  gave  notice  of  a 
motion  at  the  Diocesan  Conference,  now  five  years 
ago,  for  a  Committee  of  inquiry  into  the  operation  of 
the  Act,  with  a  view  to  moving  Parliament  for  its 
amendment.  Neither  he  nor  any  of  the  speakers  on 
his  side  could  point  out  any  defect,  or  hardship,  or 
danger  in  the  Act  which  was  not  inseparable  from 
the  custom  of  dilajDidations.  Instances  of  seeming 
hardship  were  adduced,  but  they  were  just  such  as 


WILLIAM  HEBERDEN  KARSLAKE. 


127 


had  occurred  thousands  of  times  in  the  old  system. 
I  could  have  matched  any  of  tliem  from  my  own  ex- 
perience. There  was,  too,  the  absurdity  of  supposing 
that  Parliament,  after  giving  a  good  deal  of  time  to 
a  not  very  popular  or  interesting  subject,  would  be 
likely  within  five  or  six  years  to  reopen  it  and  begin 
all  the  work  again.  The  Conference,  consisting 
equally  of  lay  and  clerical  gentleman,  and  repi'esent- 
ing  patrons  as  well  as  incumbents,  voted  in  favor  of 
leaving  the  question  alone  for  the  present. 

Karslake,  however,  had  had  his  second  turn  of 
speaking,  and  had  touched  the  old  chord  that  there 
was  much  to  be  said  on  both  sides.  Sir  Stafford 
Northcote  was  there.  He  afterwards  confessed  to 
have  been  very  much  bored  by  the  discussion.  Speak- 
ing and  hearing  speeches,  he  said,  always  did  bore 
him.  He  must  have  been  occasionally  tantalized  by 
the  vision  of  a  glass  of  sherry,  for  he  added  that  Con- 
ferences, in  his  opinion,  tended  to  the  consumption  of 
strong  drink,  and  so  defeated  their  own  wishes  in  the 
temperance  direction.  But  while  not  quite  up  to  the 
mark,  he  had  been  basking  under  the  mild  wisdom  of 
his  native  county,  listening  to  the  dear  old'strain  that 
there  is  much  to  be  said  on  both  sides.  It  seemed  to 
take  possession  of  his  whole  nature.  At  the  lunch  he 
confided  to  the  Bishop  that  while  he  admired  the  de- 
bate, and  could  not  quarrel  with  the  decision,  yet  he 
felt  that  there  was  much  to  be  said  on  both  sides. 
He  thought  both  sides  ouglit  to  be  heard  again,  and 
that  Conference  and  Parliament  ought  to  have  the 
opportunity  of  reconsidering  the  whole  matter. 
Would  the  Bishop,  on  the  reassembling  of  the  Con 
ference  in  the  afternoon,  propose  to  rescind  the  morn- 
ing's vote  and  appoint  the  Committee  asked  for  ? 


128 


REMINISCENCES. 


The  Bishop,  usually  decided,  and  very  adverse  to 
third  courses,  was  on  this  occasion  immediately  con- 
verted to  the  doctrine  that  there  is  much  to  be  said 
on  both  sides.  He  agreed  to  put  Sir  Stafford's  pro- 
posal to  the  Conference.  It  was  a  little  surprised, 
but  acquiesced  at  once. 

The  Committee  was  appointed,  Karslake  in  the 
chair.  It  met  often,  was  very  painstaking  and  mi- 
nute. In  due  time  it  brought  out  and  circulated 
a  Report  with  numerous  suggestions  for  the  amend- 
ment of  the  Act.  They  would  have  made  no  sub- 
stantial, or  even  perceptible,  difference  in  the  opera- 
tion of  the  Act,  if  that  were  at  all  desirable,  and  they 
certainly  did  not  amount  to  a  case  for  reopening  the 
whole  question  in  Parliament.  The  Report  only 
exists  as  a  monument  of  Karslake's  all-persuasive 
eloquence,  to  which  even  a  statesman  and  a  most 
business-like  prelate  had  succumbed. 

The  next  Conference,  I  sat  by  Karslake,  enjoying 
what  some  one  has  truly  styled  Dean  Boyd's  princely 
hospitalities,  and  talking  over  old  times  and  old  peo- 
ple with  my  Carthusian  and  Oriel  contemporary.  I 
found  he  had  not  much  to  learn  from  me,  and  I  had 
something  to  learn  from  him.  I  should  add  that  he 
had  been  that  day  speaking  at  the  Conference,  and 
that  it  was  strongly  in  favor  of  working  by  the  exist- 
ing organization  of  the  Church,  instead  of  attempting 
new  formations,  necessarily  dependent  on  the  charac- 
ter and  circumstances  of  individuals,  for  whom  the 
Church  could  not  be  answerable. 

The  day  after  the  Conference  there  was  held  the 
largest  and  most  distinguished  meeting  ever  known 
in  that  part  of  Devonshire,  to  present  a  testimonial 
to  the  Rector  of  Meshaw,  on  his  retirement  from  one 


WILLIAM  HEBERDEN  KAESLAKE.  129 


of  his  public  offices,  and  in  recognition  of  laborious 
services  now  extending  to  near  half  a  century.  It 
might  be  said  that  everybody  in  Devonshire  was 
there,  or  would  have  been  there  if  he  could.  Kars- 
lake  had  been  consulted  as  to  the  form  of  the  testi- 
monial. A  service  of  plate  he  did  not  want.  It 
would  hardly  suit  the  moderate  scale  of  his  position, 
and  upon  an  exactly  similar  occasion,  and  after  a  very 
similar  career,  his  father  had  been  presented  with  a 
testimonial  of  that  sort,  and  had  handed  it  down  to 
him.  Excepting  that  he  would  like  a  "  Georgian  " 
silver  bowl  as  an  emblem  of  good  companionship,  he 
asked  that  the  bulk  of  the  sum  subscribed  should 
be  devoted  to  his  church,  particularly  to  the  tower. 
It  had  been  left  out  at  the  restoration  of  the  edifice 
in  1836,  partly  for  want  of  funds,  partly  owing  to 
"  immaturity  of  taste "  in  the  architecture  of  that 
date. 

The  presentation  was  such  a  ceremony  as  Devon- 
shire rejoices  in.  There  was  something  almost 
Chinese  in  the  continual  reference  to  ancestries,  and 
to  friendships  that  had  lasted  for  many  generations. 
Karslake,  Lord  Fortescue  said,  had  been  the  soul  of 
business,  the  rule  of  good  order,  and  the  bond  of 
peace.  He  had  been  patient  and  weighty,  giving  all 
sides  an  equal  hearing,  and  winning  everybody's  good 
woi'd.  He  had  acted  for  the  Bishop  as  Inspector  of 
Education  for  twenty  years,  and  hud  built  schools  in 
his  own  parish,  not  quite  so  smart  as  the  schools  of 
this  date,  but  sufficient.  For  many  years  no  boy  or 
girl  had  grown  up  in  his  parish  without  learning  to 
read  and  write  fairly,  and  cipher  a  little.  He  had 
been  one  of  the  founders  of  the  Devon  County  School 
for  the  middle  classes.    He  had  hunted,  and,  upon 


130 


REMINISCENCES. 


giving  it  up,  he  had  observed  to  Lord  Fortescue, 
"  Well,  I 've  enjoyed  it  for  fifty  yeai's,  but  I  can  lay 
my  hand  on  my  heart  and  say  with  truth  that  I  never 
sacrificed  either  public  or  parish  duty  to  a  day's  sport, 
though  1  won't  say  that  I  have  never  taken  some  pains 
to  combine  the  tAvo  together."  Devonshire,  Lord 
Fortescue  added,  was  showing  that  day  that  it  was 
not  necessary  to  have  very  high  rank,  or  very  large 
possessions,  or  dazzling  eloquence,  or  exceptionally 
brilliant  abilities,  to  acquire  power  and  do  good  in 
our  generation. 

Karslake's  reply  was  simple  indeed,  and  modest. 
Probably  like  most  Charterhouse,  and  Oriel  men  too, 
he  hated  themes,  verses,  and  original  composition  of 
all  kinds ;  but  now  there  was  something  to  say,  and 
his  fate  was  strong  upon  him,  so  he  said  it  as  no 
essay  writer  could  ever  have  done.  It  might  be  some 
good  had  resulted  to  that  neighborhood,  and  even  to 
the  county,  during  the  many  years  it  had  pleased 
God  to  allow  him  to  live  and  work  in  it.  He  thanked 
the  company  for  allowing  him  to  dedicate  the  greater 
part  of  the  testimonial  to  the  improvement  of  the 
church,  in  which  now  for  over  fifty  years  he  had  been 
permitted  to  minister,  unremittingly,  or  with  very 
few  exceptions.  He  could  claim  for  himself  but  a 
very  small  part  of  the  thanks.  What  ability  he  had 
was  a  deposit  to  be  rendered  an  account  of.  His 
living  amongst  them  he  had  always  considered  the 
work  of  Providence,  and  not  his  own  will,  as  his 
father  placed  him  in  the  Rectory  of  Meshaw  because 
he  thought  he  would  be  of  some  use  there.  He 
could  not  either  forget  the  deep  debt  of  gratitude 
which  he  owed  to  his  excellent  mother  for  her  train- 
ing and  her  prayers  ;  nor  could  he  forget  his  father's 


WILLUM  HEBERDEN  KAESLAKE. 


131 


liberality  in  giving  him  opportunities  for  advancing 
las  education  by  sending  him  first  to  a  public  school, 
and  afterwards  to  one  of  the  best  and  most  esteemed 
colleges  at  Oxford.  All  these  were  circumstances 
for  which  they  were  not  to  thank  him,  but  for  which 
they  had  to  thank  others. 

Three  or  four  days  after  this  Karslake  was  not 
lieard  moving  about  at  his  usual  early  hour.  He  was 
found  in  bed,  as  if  asleep,  but  not  to  wake  to  this 
world.  It  was  a  strangely  different  visitation  that 
founded  his  branch  of  the  family,  and  no  doubt 
tinged  its  religious  sentiment.  In  1749  Henry  Kars- 
lake, his  wife,  and  two  sons  were  burnt  to  death  in 
their  own  house.  A  nurse  jumped  out  of  the  win- 
dow, with  a  babe  in  her  arms.  This  was  the  grand- 
father of  my  school  and  college  contemporary. 


CHAPTER  XC. 


SIK  GILBERT  SCOTT. 

Why  Karslake  took  up  the  question  of  dilapida- 
tions so  warmly  I  know  not,  but  lie  could  not  fail  to 
know  of  hard  cases,  and  like  all  old  residents  he 
would  be  pretty  sure  to  sympathize  rather  with  the 
old  people  than  with  the  new.  Yet  it  is  a  matter  of 
all  others  in  which  there  is  much  to  be  said  on  both 
sides. 

When  I  was  in  Northamptonshire,  in  1833,  the 
neigli boring  living  of  Wappenham  fell  vacant.  I  had 
already  heard  of  the  incumbent,  and  of  the  dilapida- 
tion case  he  was  likely  to  leave.  He  was  a  very  aged 
man,  and  for  twenty  j^ears  or  more  he  had  made  a 
practice  of  letting  everything  go  down,  or,  as  he 
said,  to  be  settled  in  the  dilapidations.  The  rectory 
buildings  were  all  but  ruinous.  The  wife  had  en- 
tered into  the  plan,  with  what  expectations  I  know 
not. 

The  patron  gave  the  living  to  a  son  of  "  Bible 
Scott,"  an  elderly  man  with  a  family,  but  with  small 
means.  Very  shortly  there  was  a  great  outcry  in  the 
neighborhood.  It  rallied  round  the  widow,  whose 
case  was  indeed  deplorable.  The  new  Rector  had 
sent  for  his  son,  "  a  lad  in  a  builder's  office."  He 
had  come  down  with  hammers  and  axes,  and  had 
half  knocked  to  pieces  what  was  left  of  the  old 
buildings  to  find  out  the  cracks.    He  had  laid  the 


SIR  GILBERT  SCOTT. 


133 


dilapidations  at  <£1,800,  such  a  sum  as  had  never 
been  heard  of.  The  widow  was  advised  to  make  a 
liberal  offer,  <£  1,200.  It  was  finally  settled  at 
X  1,500,  but  even  that  was  thought  a  monstrous  ex- 
tortion. Mr.  Scott  had  to  build  a  new  parsonage.  It 
did  not  seem  to  me  at  all  an  excessive  building ; 
indeed,  to  my  fancy  too  economically  compact.  But 
it  cost  him  £2,500,  and  ,£1,000  of  it  he  had  to  pay 
out  of  his  own  pocket.  In  two  years  he  died,  and 
the  patron  very  reasonably  and  humanely  departed 
from  the  universal  rule  of  patrons,  and  gave  the 
living  to  his  son. 

The  lad  who  did  such  justice  to  his  father,  and 
who  was  then  twenty -two  years  of  age,  became  Sir  Gil- 
bert Scott,  the  great  church  architect  of  his  age.  It 
might  be  ten  years  after  this  that  I  was  asked  to  meet 
hiin  at  Magdalen.  I  was  much  impressed  by  the 
great  extent,  variety,  and  accuracy  of  his  knowledge, 
which  presented  some  contrast  to  the  ordinary  review 
style  with  which  I  had  been  lately  familiar.  Already 
in  1844  his  name  was  up  as  one  of  the  Oxford  school, 
and  intending  church  builders  wei"e  solemnly  warned 
that  if  they  employed  him  they  would  find  them- 
selves in  for  the  offertory,  the  surplice,  and  much 
more  to  follow.  They  who  regarded  the  warning  had 
to  rue  it  afterwards,  so  quickly  did  the  "  Scott  and 
Moffatty  "  style  supersede  those  it  found  in  fashion. 

At  the  same  time,  that  is  in  1834,  and  in  the  same 
neighborhood,  there  was  a  still  more  extraordinary  di- 
lapidation case.  One  of  the  best  livings  in  the  dio- 
cese was  going  a  begging.  It  was  worth  £700  a 
year  ;  that  is,  it  ought  to  have  been  worth  that ;  but 
the  dilapidations  were  estimated  at  £7,000,  and  there 
was  no  one  from  whotn  they  could  be  recovered.  A 


134 


REMINISCENCES. 


new  incumbent,  however,  would  be  liable  for  that 
amount  to  his  successor.  A  long  time  ago  somebody- 
had  left  an  estate  in  the  parish  for  the  endowment  of 
a  school.  No  attempts  were  ever  made  to  raise  the 
school  to  a  higher  class,  and  the  result  was  that  last 
century  found  the  endowment  of  the  school  rather 
better  than  the  endowment  of  the  living,  while  it  re- 
mained a  mere  village  school.  As  the  incumbent  ap- 
pointed the  master,  he  would  have  no  difficulty  in 
arranging  the  matter  to  his  own  convenience.  How- 
ever, in  the  last  century,  an  Act  of  Parliament  was  ob- 
tained for  the  union  of  the  two  endowments  in  the 
person  of  the  incumbent,  on  the  condition  of  his  keep- 
ing up  tlie  school.  This  involved  a  double  liability  to 
dilapidations.  The  incumbent  had  to  maintain  in 
proper  order  parsonage,  chancel,  glebe  buildings, 
school,  schoolmaster's  house,  school  farm  buildings, 
gates,  fences,  etc.,  etc.  At  the  time  I  speak  of,  that 
is  in  1838-1835,  the  recently  deceased  incumbent  had 
let  everything  go  to  ruin,  and  it  was  said  the  very- 
large  sum  I  have  named  would  be  barely  sufficient  to 
put  them  in  order,  and  rebuild  them  where  necessary. 
What  became  of  the  unfortunate  living  I  know  not. 
The  name  I  have  forgotten,  but  any  old  incumbent 
of  that  part  of  the  county  lying  west  of  Northamp- 
ton would  remember  it.  I  must  add  that  similar 
cases,  though  not  on  so  grand  a  scale,  were  of  frequent 
occurrence  in  those  days. 


CHAPTER  XCL 


EDWAED  W.  L.  POPHAM. 

There  are  careers  that  leave  a  deep  impression  by 
their  sadness  and  their  brevity  ;  like  one  dreadful 
scene,  or  a  passing  funeral  pomp.  A  youth  rises  to 
notice  witli  bright  expectations  and  with  the  world 
before  him.  He  realizes  it  himself,  and  stretches  out 
his  hand  to  receive  his  rightful  share  of  whatever  he 
may  most  value.  He  is  suddenly  struck  down  with 
one  form  of  calamity  or  another.  When  he  is  down 
then  it  is  found  out  that  he  has  his  place  in  story  or 
tradition,  and  that  it  is  a  long  history  of  which  we 
have  been  witnessing  a  single  episode. 

Every  Oriel  man  of  that  date  must  have  a  sad  rec- 
ollection of  poor  Popham  —  Edward  William  Ley- 
bourne  Popham,  as  he  appears  in  the  Calendar.  He 
w;is  heir  of  Littlecote  House,  on  the  Kennet,  near 
Hungerford,  the  scene  of  the  dreadful  story  told  vari- 
ously in  "  Rokeby,"  and  in  the  notes  to  that  jjoern. 
The  alleged  period  was  Queen  Elizabeth's,  and  Pop- 
ham was  descended  from  the  judge  said  to  have  pur- 
chased Littlecote  with  the  reward  of  his  iniquity. 

He  came  up,  I  believe,  from  Harrow,  as  a  gentle- 
man commoner  ;  somewhat  short  in  stature,  with  fine 
massive  features,  dark  complexion,  and  an  expression 
of  much  spirit  and  intelligence.  He  looked  like  a 
man  who  was  to  make  his  mark  in  the  world.  He 
was,  I  think,  rather  shy  of  the  gentleman  commoners, 


136 


BEMINISCENCES. 


or  they  of  him,  and  he  went  along  rather  with  those 
who  made  hterary  pretensions.  He  had  had  a  great 
craze  for  Byron.  "  Don  Juan  "  was  then  as  much  to 
be  seen  everywhere  as  Dickens'  last  novel  afterwards. 
When  I  knew  him  he  was  possessed  with  Napoleon. 
His  walls  were  hung  with  large,  dark  engravings  of 
the  Emperor,  his  marshals  and  his  battles.  He  could 
tui'n  to  any  passage  of  that  wonderful  history.  Some- 
how I  associated  this  passion  with  Arnold's  extrava- 
gant estimate  of  the  French  military  character,  but  I 
cannot  recall  anything  in  support  of  this  impression. 

There  came  up  a  feeling  in  the  college  that  Pop- 
ham  was  becoming  strange  ;  that  he  talked  too  much, 
and  had  an  absent  manner,  as  if  finding  it  easier  to 
talk  than  to  listen.  I  called  once  or  twice,  at  the  sug- 
gestion of  friends,  who  thought  he  wanted  the  relief  of 
new  faces  and  topics.  Bonamy  Price,  I  think  it  was, 
particularly,  who  came  to  me  with  a  look  of  alarm, 
and  asked  me  to  see  a  little  more  of  Popham.  He 
found  his  rooms  very  dull  and  gloomy.  They  were  in 
fact  the  dullest  and  gloomiest  in  the  whole  college, 
and  it  was  a  wonder  whj',  in  a  college  where  there 
was  so  much  delicate  consideration  of  circumstances, 
a  gentleman  commoner  coming  from  a  public  school 
had  not  better  rooms  assigned  to  him.  They  were 
those  on  the  ground  floor,  between  the  inner  Quad 
and  Oriel  Lane ;  and  a  quarter  of  the  room  looking 
into  the  lane  had  been  cut  off  for  the  use  of  the  Pro- 
vost's house.  Popham  declared  that  the  heavy  tread 
of  some  one  passing  up  and  down  this  passage,  which 
was  really  pait  of  his  own  rightful  floor,  fixed  upon 
his  mind  and  oppressed  him.  He  was  always  expect- 
ing it,  and  thinking  of  it.  Of  course  any  other  trifle 
would  have  fixed  on  his  mind  as  easily,  for  these 


EDWARD  W.  L.  POPHAM. 


137 


things  are  but  parasites  attacking  an  unhealthy 
frame. 

Matters  began  to  look  serious,  and  the  question 
was  what  they  were  going  to  do  with  Pophara.  He 
settled  that  question  himself.  I  went  to  a  lecture  at 
Tyler's.  After  all  had  assembled,  his  chair  remained 
vacant.  When  the  lecture  had  been  going  on  about 
ten  minutes  very  heavy  treads  were  heard  on  the 
staircase,  the  door  was  flung  wide  open,  Popham 
strode  in,  without  shutting  the  door,  or  taking  off 
his  cap,  or  offering  Tyler  any  salutation,  and  sat  down 
in  his  chair  at  right  angles  to  the  table  and  not  very 
near  it.  Opening  his  book  upside  down,  he  sat  lost 
in  thought.  Tyler  expostulated,  "  Mr.  Popham,  could 
you  not  sit  to  the  table  ?  "  "  Mr.  Popham,  have  you 
found  the  place  ? "  "  Mr.  Popham,  are  you  aware 
that  your  cap  is  on?"  In  five  minutes  more  the 
poor  man  burst  into  a  violent  fit  of  laughter  that 
stopped  the  lecture.  As  he  went  on  laughing,  Tyler 
had  to  say,  "  1  think,  Mr.  Popham,  you  had  better 
retii'e  till  you  can  compose  yourself."  Popham 
rushed  out  of  the  room,  still  laughing,  and  of  course 
leaving  others  to  shut  the  door.  Lord  Mahnesbury 
would,  I  think,  be  able  to  verify  my  recollections  of 
this  very  sad  scene. 

That  same  afternoon  he  left  the  college,  after 
writing  on  a  slip  of  paper — a  three-cornered  note  I 
heard  —  a  rather  incoherent  and  uncivil  message  to 
his  tutor,  or  the  Dean.  It  was  his  last  appearance 
in  the  college,  or  indeed  in  society.  He  remained  a 
lunatic  till  his  death,  a  few  years  ago,  and  for  half  a 
century  a  high  county  position  was  in  abeyance. 
Such  was  the  fate  of  a  youth  for  whom  everything 
had  been  made  to  his  hand,  and  who  might  have 
achieved  any  greatness,  as  far  as  man  could  see. 


CHAPTER  XCII. 


SIR  JOHN  D.  HARDING. 

John  Dorney  Harding  came  to  the  house  in 
which  I  was  at  Charterhouse,  himself  hardly  twelve, 
and  three  years  my  junior.  He  was  an  interesting, 
excitable,  and  talkative  fellow,  precocious  and  weakly, 
evidently  conscious  that  his  tongue  would  have  to 
make  up  for  the  want  of  bodily  strength.  He  could 
smite  with  his  only  weapon,  and  was  not  always  on 
the  defensive.  He  suffered  much  from  scrofulous 
swellings  in  the  neck.  He  had  ali'eady  travelled  in 
Italy  and  elsewhere,  and  had  kept  a  journal  which 
he  brought  to  school.  I  got  hold  of  it  one  day,  and 
read  portions  of  it  aloud,  in  his  pi'esence,  with  a  little 
envy  perhaps,  and  with  some  emphasis  on  the  lan- 
guage, if  childish  or  stilted.  We  came  to  like  one 
another,  and  Kingsley  told  me  that  in  the  long  and 
frequent  fits  of  delirium  which  preceded  his  death 
he  often  mentioned  my  name,  and  always  kindly. 

I  very  early  said  that  Harding  would  alternately 
surprise  and  disappoint,  and  yet  he  surprised  and 
disappointed  to  a  greater  extent  than  I  could  even 
have  conceived.  His  physical  frame  was  unequal  to 
sustain  the  flights  of  his  mind  and  the  elations  of  his 
mercurial  temperament.  This  was  but  a  poor  prepa- 
ration for  the  regular  wear  and  tear  of  English  life, 
and  the  grinding  work  of  professional  and  public- 
business  in  these  days.    He  was  always  above  him- 


SIR  JOHN  D.  HARDING. 


139 


self  one  day  or  one  minute,  and  unequal  to  himself 
the  next.  He  followed  me  to  Oriel,  and  I  soon  heard 
that  he  was  making  a  great  figure  at  the  Union,  which 
I  then  little  frequented  myself.  His  appearance  was 
much  in  his  favor  ;  his  voice  was  agreeable  and  his 
fluency  inexhaustible ;  but  there  came  the  misgiving, 
"  How  long  will  they  keep  hira  up  ?  "  In  due  time 
I  was  told  of  his  failure,  not  in  brilliancy  but  in 
argument  and  sense.  Then  I  heard  of  great  recover- 
ies, really  able  speeches,  and  Harding's  position  im- 
proved on  the  whole. 

He  admired  Newman  much,  but  he  had  his  way 
to  make  in  the  world,  and,  as  he  thought,  to  amuse 
himself  besides.  In  town  I  soon  heard  that  he  had 
much  to  do,  and  was  a  favorite  in  society.  We  met 
occasionally.  I  always  felt  a  little  nervous  as  to  the 
next  thing  he  would  say  or  do ;  sometimes  on  his 
account,  sometimes  on  mine.  At  a  Founder's  Day 
dinner  at  Charterhouse  he  had  to  make  a  speech, 
and  he  took  the  opportunity  of  introducing  his  father, 
who  was  present,  a  fine-looking  gentleman  of  sixty, 
an  old  Carthusian  too.  "  He  had  thrashed  Russell !  " 
"  Think  of  that ! "  he  exclaimed,  "  a  man  that  had 
thrashed  Russell !  "  It  was  the  fact  that  they  had 
been  contemporaries  at  the  scliool,  and  that  Harding 
senior,  who  was  a  very  big  fellow,  had  had  a  fight 
with  Russell  and  had  beaten  him.  Russell  was  sitting 
there,  and  did  not  dispute  it.  I  doubt  whether  any- 
body likes  to  be  reminded  of  a  thrashing,  received 
even  ever  so  long  ago,  wliatever  the  rights  of  the 
quari'el  or  the  odds  of  the  contest.  But  Harding's 
taste  and  feeling  were  overmastered  by  the  idea,  and 
lie  could  not  but  out  with  it.  Perhaps,  too,  it  was 
something  like  a  retaliation  for  having  quailed  so 
long  in  the  terrible  presence  now  before  him. 


140 


REMINISCENCES. 


Lord  Derby  made  Harding  Queen's  Advocate- 
General,  and  he  was  so  far  equal  to  the  position  that 
he  took  an  early  opportunity  to  assert  precedence 
over  the  Attorney-General.  But  it  must  have  been 
clear  to  his  friends  that  he  was  overworking  himself. 
I  several  times  met  him  late  in  the  afternoon,  as  his 
anxious  wife  was  leading  him  into  the  quieter  paths 
of  Green  Park  for  a  half-hour's  peace  and  quiet, 
when  I  felt  ashamed  of  myself  for  coming  across 
them,  but  could  not  pass  without  a  word  or  two. 

The  American  Civil  War  took  Harding,  like  every- 
body else,  unawares.  He  was  about  as  little  prepared 
for  its  complications  as  the  British  Constitution  itself, 
at  least  its  administrators  and  interpreters  were  found 
to  be.  He  was  very  soon  in  difficulties.  There  arose 
the  question  of  the  detention  of  the  Alabama.  I  had 
heard  on  very  good  authority  that  Government  com- 
plained that  Harding  would  not  give  them  an  opinion. 
Meeting  Harding  in  the  streets,  I  mentioned  this. 
"  They  won't  send  me  a  case,"  he  replied.  As  I  was 
unacquainted  with,  the  etiquette  and  customs  of  the 
office,  I  could  say  nothing;  but  it  certainly  did  occur 
to  me  that  the  very  critical  character  of  the  circum- 
stances might  not  allow  of  time  to  be  lost  in  drawing 
up  a  case,  which  must  be  the  work  of  either  a  lawyer 
or  a  politician,  that  is,  either  a  professional  or  an 
unprofessional  person,  both  open  to  objection.  Per- 
haps Harding  meant  that  they  did  not  even  send  him 
a  question  to  be  answered.  He  was,  moreover,  at 
that  time  very  busy  with  some  private  business,  par- 
ticularly with  a  suit  of  the  kind  more  usually  associ- 
ated with  Doctors'  Commons. 

I  met  him  again  very  shortly  after  the  Alabama 
had  got  away.     He  told  me  that  he  had  been  ex- 


SIB  JOHN  D.  HARDING. 


141 


pecting  a  communication  from  Government  anxiously 
the  whole  week  before ;  that  the  expectation  had 
unsettled  and  unnerved  him  for  other  business  ;  and 
that  he  had  stayed  in  his  chambers  rather  later  than 
usual  on  Saturday  for  the  chance  of  hearing  at  last 
from  them.  He  had  then  gone  to  his  house  in  the 
country.  Returning  on  Monday,  when  he  was  engaged 
to  appear  in  court,  he  found  a  large  bundle  of  docu- 
ments in  a  big  envelope,  without  even  an  accompany- 
ing note,  that  had  been  dropped  into  his  letter-box 
on  Saturday  evening.  To  all  appearance,  every  letter, 
and  every  remonstrance,  and  every  affidavit,  as  fast 
as  it  had  arrived  from  Liverjjool,  had  been  piled  in  a 
pigeon-hole  till  four  or  five  o'clock  on  Saturday,  when 
the  minister,  on  taking  his  own  departure  for  the 
country,  had  directed  a  clerk  to  tie  up  the  whole 
heap  and  carry  it  to  Doctors'  Commons. 

The  people  of  the  Alabama  and  their  confederates 
among  the  authorities  of  Liverpool  knew  very  well 
the  ways  of  Her  Majesty's  ministers,  and  the  ship 
sailed  accordingly  early  on  Sunday,  when  nothing 
could  be  done  to  stop  it  till  the  middle  of  the  next 
day.  The  Alabama  was  now  in  the  Atlantic,  but 
there  was  just  a  chance  of  catching  her  or  of  stopping 
her  at  some  port.  There  were  other  possibilities. 
So  here  was  the  old  question,  aggravated  by  fresh 
complications. 

Harding's  defence  was,  of  course,  not  complete. 
At  such  a  crisis  he  ought  to  have  had  a  man  ready 
to  receive  the  papers  and  bring  them  down  to  the 
counti-y.  Yet  the  mere  chance  of  their  following 
him  might  have  prevented  him  from  recruiting  his 
strength  and  nerve  in  the  two  nights'  rest. 

But  what  a  specimen  of  British  administration  ! 


142 


REMINISCENCES. 


Here  was  a  matter  intimately  and  most  critically 
affecting  the  integrity  of  a  great  and  friendly  re- 
public, the  destinies  of  a  whole  continent,  the  rela- 
tions of  the  New  and  the  Old  World,  the  peace  of 
the  sea  as  well  as  of  the  land,  and  the  character  of 
this  country ;  really,  such  a  question  as  had  never 
been  exceeded  in  importance  in  all  history,  and  is 
not  likely  to  be  exceeded,  flung  aside  contemptuously 
by  ministers  to  their  clerks,  resting  a  week  in  a 
pigeon-hole,  then  a  couple  of  days  on  the  floor  of 
some  city  chambers,  and  not  so  much  as  looked  at 
till  the  occasion  had  gone  by.  Considered  as  mere 
slovenliness  and  indifference,  not  to  assign  motives, 
this  could  not  be  surpassed  by  the  administration 
of  Turkey,  or  Egypt,  or  any  other  country  ever 
heard  of. 

The  wretched  excuse  made  by  Government  was 
that  it  was  bound  by  the  constitutional  forms  and 
usiiges  of  this  country.  It  is  almost  needless  to  ob- 
serve, England  has  never  once  admitted  that  excuse, 
—  indeed,  it  could  not  possibly  admit  it,  in  the  case 
of  any  injury  it  might  conceive  itself  to  have  suffered 
from  another  country.  It  has  always  said  in  effect, 
"  We 've  nothing  to  do  with  your  internal  institu- 
tions, and  don't  care  a  straw,  for  them  ;  but  we  will 
have  justice  from  you."  In  a  few  weeks  Harding 
was  out  of  his  mind,  and  never  recovered  his  reason 
till  he  died. 

I  have  seen  it  solemnly  stated,  and,  in  company 
with  many  other  lies,  passing  into  history,  that  the 
action  of  Government  was  unfortunately  and  unavoid- 
ably hampered  and  delayed  by  the  illness  —  that  is, 
the  insanity  —  of  the  Queen's  Advocate-General. 
The  fact  is  there  was  not  one  of  Her  Majesty's  min- 


SIR  JOHN  D.  HARDING. 


143 


isters  who  was  not  ready  to  jump  out  of  his  skin  for 
joy  when  he  heard  of  the  escape  of  the  Alabama, 
and  it  was  they  who  drove  poor  Harding  out  of  his 
mind,  not  he  that  hampered  them. 

But  there  is  something  on  the  otlier  side  that  has 
to  be  admitted.  I  am  quite  sure  that  I  am  within 
bounds  when  I  say  that,  during  all  the  pei-iod  in 
which  I  had  had  occasion  to  observe  political  affairs, 
every  American  candidate  for  popular  favor,  and 
every  American  official  having  to  keep  his  place,  had 
found  it  necessary  to  promise  to  observe  neither 
friendship  nor  common  justice  with  the  British  peo- 
ple. American  public  men  were  bound  to  demand 
more  than  their  due  in  every  negotiation,  to  over- 
reach in  every  settlement,  and  always  to  secure  that 
there  should  still  be  something  to  quarrel  about  even 
after  our  greatest  surrender.  They  had  to  make  ib 
distinctly  known  to  all  Americans  that  they  had 
robbed  us,  insulted  us,  and  left  a  nest-egg  for  another 
quarrel.  This,  however,  does  not  justify  so  gross  an 
international  crime  as  that  told  in  the  story  of  the 
Alabama. 


CHAPTER  XCIII. 


EXAGGERATIONS. 

It  is  almost  universal  that  the  leaders  of  a  move- 
ment are  pursued  by  a  spirit  of  exaggeration,  which 
reacts  upon  themselves,  and  perhaps  even  takes  their 
place.  The  exaggerations  are  chiefly  in  the  material 
direction.  The  fii'e  kindled  in  a  great  variety  of 
natures  takes  the  form  most  natural  to  them,  and  yet 
is  so  loyal  to  the  original  fire  as  to  justify  the  claim 
to  identity.  Very  early  in  the  movement  contrasts 
were  made  between  the  calm  and  gentle  demeanor 
of  the  chiefs  and  the  acrimonious  violence  of  the 
subalterns.  In  theology,  what  the  chiefs  hinted  at  or 
left  to  the  awakened  conscience  and  quickened  imag- 
ination was  embodied  and  paraded.  If  there  was  but 
a  slight  leaning  one  way  or  another  it  was  sure  to  be 
made  more  of  by  some  imitator.  Great  men  ought 
to  remember,  but  are  apt  to  forget,  that  they  will 
have  imitators. 

Newman  left  Seager  in  charge  of  St.  Mary's  oc- 
casionally and  for  some  time.  He  was  a  man  of  sad 
aspect,  with  a  deep,  hollow  voice,  and  he  preached  so 
continually  on  hell  and  all  its  horrors  that  the  Prin- 
cipal of  Brasenose,  whose  family  attended  the  church, 
was  obliged  to  protest  and  threaten  withdrawal.  He 
could  not  answer  for  the  consequences  on  the  weaker 
members  of  his  household. 

Newman  read  the  daily  prayers  and  the  lessons 


EXAGGERATIONS. 


145 


a  little  more  quickly  than  in  the  Sunday  service.  It 
did  not  matter,  with  so  clear  a  voice,  such  distinct 
articulation,  and  such  true  emphasis.  Lewis,  I  think 
it  was,  parodied  this  rapidity  of  utterance  to  an 
extreme  which  shocked  strangers,  and  pained  even 
friends.  It  was  broadly  stated  that  the  new  school 
regarded  prayer  as  opus  ojjeratum,  that  needed  not  to 
be  felt  or  understood,  so  as  it  was  done.  Yet  Lewis 
was  a  serious  man. 

Fronde  very  early  used  to  talk  of  those  who 
preached  the  j^rayers,  as  if  edification  was  their  first 
object,  and  not  that  which  we  pray  for.  From  my 
recollection  I  cannot  help  thinking  that  Froude  him- 
self fell  into  a  perfunctory  style  by  a  too  violent 
protest  against  exaggerated  emphasis.  He  read  in  a 
solemn  and  very  penitential  tone,  but  it  was  a  mono- 
tone.   Whatever  he  did,  others  did  more. 

Early  in  the  movement  I  was  consulted  from  time 
to  time  on  plans  for  the  restoration  of  churches. 
Newman  passed  these  matters  sometimes  to  me. 
The  main  question  always  was  whether  the  reader  of 
the  prayers  should  face  east,  west,  north,  or  south. 
One  winter  day  I  walked  into  Norbury  church,  in 
Derbyshire,  then  in  the  process  of  restoration.  Be- 
sides other  beautiful  features,  there  was  an  ancient 
chancel  screen.  Workpeople  were  busy  all  over. 
The  Rector,  a  handsome  young  man,  had  in  his 
hands  a  slab  of  wood  to  represent  a  reading-desk. 
This  he  inserted  at  a  proper  slope  between  tlie  mull- 
ions  of  the  screen,  first  standing  in  the  nave  and 
looking  into  the  chancel,  then  standing  in  the  cliancel 
and  looking  into  the  nave,  then  ti'ying  the  other  plan 
again,  evidently  not  likely  to  satisfy  himself  with 
either  alternative.    Yet  these  matters  were  treated 

VOL.  II.  10 


146 


BEMIXISCENCES. 


as  rigorously  and  peremptorily  in  these  days  as  if  all 
depended  on  them. 

Apostolic  succession  became  the  matter  of  very 
strange  treatment  and  great  exaggeration.  As  stated 
above,  it  was  almost  the  first  point  of  divergence  from 
the  "Evangelical"  party,  and  the  first  indication  of 
the  line  to  be  taken  in  this  leap  into  the  dark.  The 
Low  Church,  particularly  as  represented  by  the 
Church  Missionary  Society,  and  by  its  complications 
with  Presbyterians  and  Dissenters,  had  utterly  dis- 
carded the  idea  of  Bishops  being  in  any  sense  the 
special  successors  of  the  Apostles,  and  necessary  to  a 
Church.  The  first  "  Tract  for  the  Times  "  rallied 
the  threatened,  scattered,  and  discomfited  Church  of 
England  round  the  Episcopate  as  far  above  the  other 
orders,  and  necessary  to  the  full  enjoyment  of  spirit- 
ual gifts  and  privileges.  It  claimed  for  the  Bishops 
distinctively  the  rank  of  Apostles.  The  clergy  every- 
where took  the  cue,  and  the  party  ran  the  narrowest 
chance  of  being  called,  indeed  of  calling  itself,  that 
of  the  Apostolicals. 

Newman  himself  probably  saved  it  from  this  de- 
nomination by  his  own  resolute  protest  against  the 
use  of  the  term  "  Evangelicals  ;  "  a  word  which  I 
certainly  never  heard  pass  his  lips.  One  device  for 
escaping  the  use  of  the  word  I  have  mentioned, 
namely,  the  substitution  of  the  algebraic  term  x ;  but, 
in  fact,  the  party  was  almost  always  referred  to  as 
"  Peculiars." 

Before  Temple  became  master  of  Rugby  I  met  him 
at  Dr.  John  Ogle's.  After  dinner  the  talk  ran  on 
Church  subjects ;  at  last  on  Apostolic  succession. 
Ogle,  seeing  Temple  silent,  thought  to  draw  hira  out. 
"  What  have  you  to  saj^  on  Apostolic  succession. 


EXAGGERATIONS. 


147 


Temple  ?  "  The  reply  was,  "  Nothing  ;  "  meaning,  I 
suppose,  that  he  had  not  given  such  thought  to  it  as 
would  justify  an  expression  of  opinion.  The  Bishop 
now  observes,  "  There  is  no  denying  the  fact  of 
Apostolic  succession."  The  Bishops  generally  ac- 
cepted this  new  homage  in  wise  silence.  Their  posi- 
tion is  so  strong  and  so  unchallenged  that  they  need 
no  minute  inquiry  into  their  pedigree.  There  they 
are,  and  their  clergy  must  acknowledge  them  or  rue 
it.  Certainly  it  was  an  exaggeration  to  preach  Epis- 
copacy, and  not  to  preach  the  Presbytery  pari  passu, 
as  Dean  Hook  had  occasion  to  discover  before  long. 

Very  soon  there  were  strange  reports  of  what  men 
were  doing  in  the  way  of  literal  compliance  with  the 
new  principles.  They  were  forbidding  laymen,  for 
any  purpose  whatever,  to  enter  within  the  commun- 
ion rail,  or  even  approach  it,  except  on  solemn  occa- 
sions. They  were  soon  going  much  further  than 
that.  It  must  strike  anybody  who  travels  how  much 
less  particuhir  Roman  Catholics  are,  outside  a  certain 
doctrinal  line,  than  we  are.  I  have  seen  Milan  Ca- 
thedral filled  with  an  immense  multitude  of  the  sim- 
plest and  roughest  country  folk,  surrounding  the  altar 
and  in  contact  with  it,  so  close  indeed  that  it  required 
force  to  enable  the  ministering  clergy  to  make  their 
way  to  it.  Roman  Catholics  generally  agree  with 
our  dissenters  in  telling  us  that  we  worship  our 
churches  ;  that  is,  in  their  estimate,  fabrics  of  wood, 
brick,  and  stone.  They  know  what  they  worship, 
they  tell  us,  and  we  don't. 


CHAPTER  XCIV. 
pusey's  sermon  on  sin  after  baptism. 

I  HEARD  Pusey's  great  sermon  on  Hebrews  vi.  4, 
5,  6.  It  was  at  Christ  Church,  and  every  corner  of 
the  church  was  filled.  One  might  have  heard  a  pin 
drop,  as  they  say.  Every  word  told.  The  key-note 
was  the  word  "  irreparable,"  pronounced  every  now 
and  then  with  the  force  of  a  judgment.  Not  a  soul 
could  have  left  that  church  without  deep  and  painful 
feelings.  Stunned  for  a  time,  tliey  afterwards  came 
to  themselves  and  thought  more  about  it.  I  have  not 
read  the  sermon,  nor  have  I  read  the  explanatory 
"  Tract  for  the  Times  "  on  the  subject.  I  have  only 
my  recollections.  How  came  I  to  be  so  painfully 
impressed  with  the  fearful  key-note  of  the  sermon,  in 
the  face  of  the  plain  difference  between  our  own 
infant  baptism  and  the  baptism  described  by  the 
writer  of  the  Epistle,  which  followed  a  careful  prep- 
aration, a  solemn  engagement,  and  for  some  time  a 
consistent  Christian  life  ?  How  came  I  to  overlook 
the  rhetorical  rather  than  doctrinal  tone  of  the  text, 
and,  even  more,  of  the  context  ?  How  came  I  now 
to  think  of  the  passage  what  I  had  never  thought 
before,  familiar  as  it  had  been  to  me  ? 

It  seems  to  me  that  the  word  irreparable,  with 
which  Pusey  every  now  and  then  smote  the  listening 
crowd,  as  with  a  scourge,  is  both  the  argument  of  the 
sermon  and  the  reply  to  it.    There  can  be  no  doubt 


PUSEY'S  SERMON  ON  SIN  AFTER  BAPTISM.  149 


that  all  sin  is  irreparable ;  any  act  of  sin  whatever. 
It  leaves  its  consequences  in  heart,  mind,  body,  and 
soul,  and  in  those  who  share  it  or  sutfer  from  it.  This 
is  not  a  truth  of  revelation,  but  of  natural  fact.  The 
sinner  —  and  vvlio  is  not  a  sinner?  —  who  imagines 
upon  any  ground  whatever  that  by  contrition,  faith, 
and  renewed  obedience  he  makes  things  just  as  they 
■were  before  he  sinned  must  be  an  idiot,  or  a  wretched 
self-deceiver,  as  the  very  heathens  may  tell  him. 
That  he  now  repents  and  obeys  he  may  well  be 
thankful  for,  for  that  is  the  state  of  grace.  But  he 
cannot  help  the  universal  order  of  things  from  taking 
its  course :  he  has  done  mischief  to  himself  and  to 
others:  he  has  defiled,  robbed,  injured,  and  more  or 
less  destroyed  himself  and  others,  and  he  can  no 
more  bring  back  things  as  they  were  than  by  any 
spiritual  act  he  can  restore  a  broken  limb,  bring  back 
a  squandered  estate,  recover  a  blasted  reputation,  or 
efface  from  memory  his  vicious  and  blasphemous 
utterances.  Pusey  would  not  say  just  this,  but  it 
was  the  actually  irreparable  character  of  sin  that  he 
worked  on.  But  then  he  did  more.  He  invested 
that  with  a  doctrinal  character,  and  made  out  that 
the  writer  of  the  Epistle  tells  us  more  than  we  know 
already.  He  made  it  a  revelation.  That,  no  doubt, 
is  a  common  course,  and  if  Pusey  did  it  with  terrible 
effect,  that  was  the  accident  of  his  wonderful  power. 

Reports  of  the  sermon,  probably  exaggerated, 
spread  all  over  the  kingdom.  Pusey,  it  was  said, 
left  all  sinners,  if  they  had  ever  been  baptized,  to  the 
uncovenanted  mercies  of  God  ;  and  in  that  case,  it 
was  said,  it  would  be  better  to  follow  the  example  of 
Constantine,  and  put  off  baptism  to  the  last  hour. 

Samuel  Wilberforce  came  up  suddenly,  about  a  fort- 


150 


EEMINISCENCES. 


night  after  the  sermon,  to  ask  for  an  explanation. 
For  this  he  came  to  his  brother  Robert,  and  they 
went  together  to  Newman.  In  my  humble  opinion, 
if  they  were  to  go  to  anybody  about  the  sermon,  they 
ought  to  have  gone  to  Pusey  himself.  Pusey  had  his 
own  style,  as  Newman  had ;  and  neither  of  them 
could  be  or  would  be  answerable  for  the  other,  unless 
upon  a  sudden  appeal  to  their  mutual  loyalty  as 
friends.  The  sermon  was  not  a  "  Tract  for  the 
Times,"  though  even  that  would  not  have  made  one 
writer  answerable  for  another,  and  it  was  veiy  char- 
acteristic of  Pusey.  But  it  was  S.  Wilberforce's 
way  to  take  the  course  most  easy  and  convenient  to 
himself,  without  considering  much  what  was  due  to 
others. 

I  was  then  on  the  same  landing,  and  heard  a  very 
animated  conversation  going  on  till  very  late  in  the 
evening.  When  the  brothers  had  bade  Newman 
good-night,  they  came  into  my  room,  and  then  I 
learnt  what  they  had  been  tallcing  about ;  but  all  that 
Samuel  let  out  was  his  great  admiration  of  Newman. 
However,  they  remained  talking,  perhaps  resting  from 
the  severer  discussions  of  the  next  room.  After  a 
while  the  door  opened,  and  Newman  walked  in.  It 
was  to  make  some  further  explanation  ;  some  things 
he  had  forgotten,  or  which  might  not  have  been 
understood.  He  left.  A  minute  after,  the  brothers 
left,  Samuel  observing  what  a  theologian  I  ought  to 
be  in  such  an  atmosphere,  and  Robert,  with  a  smile, 
adding  a  reminder  tluit  a  fish  might  be  long  in  the  sea 
without  becoming  salt.  I  don't  know  how  Newman 
felt  it,  but  to  myself  it  was  a  very  great  surprise 
when  Samuel,  a  fortnight  after,  made  a  public  and 
very  energetic  protest  against  Pusey's  sermon,  and 
the  teaching  supposed  to  be  associated  with  it. 


CHAPTER  XCV. 
ST.  Luke's,  chelsea. 

Few  changes  in  our  history  can  have  been  more 
sudden,  more  rapid,  and  more  complete  than  that 
from  the  Greek  and  Roman  styles  in  church  building 
to  the  whole  range  of  the  media3val  or  so-called  Gothic 
styles.  At  Charterhouse  I  remember  Hale,  after- 
ward Archdeacon,  ascribing  the  unexampled  peace 
and  prosperity  of  George  IV.'s  reign  to  the  Parlia- 
mentary grant  of  a  million  for  new  churches.  Many 
of  the  churches  thus  built  were  in  the  suburbs  of  the 
metropolis,  and  most  of  these  I  saw  building.  They 
are  all  in  debased  Greek  or  Italian,  and  nothing  can 
be  uglier.  I  had  for  a  long  time  in  my  keeping  a 
handsome  volume,  with  engravings  of  all  the  Surrey 
chui'ches.  Meeting  Samuel  Wilberforce,  then  newly 
Archdeacon  of  Surrey,  I  congratulated  him  on  having 
the  ugliest  lot  of  churches  in  England  to  look  after. 
He  corrected  me,  as  he  generally  managed  to  do. 
Hampshire  was  worse.  Ugliness  in  flint,  however,  is 
not  so  bad  as  ugliness  in  Bath  stone. 

The  culminating  feat  of  the  classic  style  in  this 
country  is  St.  Pancras,  in  the  New  Road,  the  prog- 
ress of  which  I  used  to  watch  with  intense  interest. 
Canon  Moore  devoted  himself  to  this  work,  and  for 
the  sake  of  it  commuted  into  a  Parliamentary  rate  for 
its  execution  an  old  church  i-ate  much  contested,  and 
levied  with  difficulty.    Everything  is  there  sacrificed 


152 


BEMINTSCENCES. 


to  the  exterior,  which  is  sadly  too  monumental.  In- 
deed, the  church,  with  its  imposing  entrances  to  the 
sepulchral  crj'pt,  is  a  curious  memorial  of  the  chief 
idea  of  church  endowment  prevailing  at  that  time  — 
burial  fees. 

Before  the  days  of  the  movement,  "  Gothic,"  that 
is  Perpendicular  and  Tudor,  were  becoming  favorite 
styles  for  country  seats  of  the  more  ambitious  sort ; 
Fonthill  Abbey,  for  example,  and  Eaton  Hall.  The 
latter  I  went  over  in  1829.  There  were  pointed 
arches  and  mullioned  windows  everywhere ;  every- 
where Gothic  niches,  containing  generally  classic 
vases,  some  of  them  gilt ;  a  library  copied  from  the 
Lady  Chapel  at  SalisbLir}^  and  towers,  turrets,  pin- 
nacles, and  battlements  ad  libitum.  The  papers  tell 
us  that  all  this  has  been  cleared  away  for  a  return  to 
the  more  picturesque  "  Decorated." 

To  pass  over  less  important  or  less  successful  build- 
ings, if  St.  Pancras  is  to  be  regarded  as  the  climax  of 
the  classic  style  of  church  building,  to  St.  Luke's, 
Chelsea,  must  be  assigned  the  honor  of  heading  the 
Gothic  revival.  In  1829,  Heurtley,  the  present  Mar- 
garet Professor  of  Divinity,  became  assistant  master 
at  a  newly  established  Proprietary  School  at  Bromp- 
ton.  Not  long  after  I  was  some  days  with  him. 
There  was  to  be  evening  service  at  St.  Luke's,  Chel- 
sea, and  a  missionary  sermon.  In  those  days  evening 
services  were  not  in  favor  with  the  higher  sort  of 
clergy.  The  dissenters  liked  them,  so  the  clergy  did 
not.  They  promoted  flirtations,  and  they  helped  the 
pickpockets.  That  gigantic  institution,  the  metro- 
politan police,  was  then  in  its  infancy.  But  Dr. 
Gerald  Wellesley  had  been  prevailed  upon  to  try  the 
experiment.  Sanke}*,  the  head  master  of  the  above 
school,  was  to  preach, 


ST.  Luke's,  chelsea. 


153 


I  was  very  desirous  to  see  the  interior  of  the  church, 
on  account  of  its  vaulted  roof,  one  of  Barry's  earliest 
and  boldest  achievements.  There  had  been  much 
controversy  about  it.  The  architects  generally  were 
cautious  in  what  they  said,  but  the  world  in  general 
prophesied  ill  of  the  roof.  They  called  the  whole 
building  a  pasteboard  structure,  utterly  wanting  the 
massiveness  associated  with  vaulting.  Where  were 
the  thick  walls,  and  the  huge  buttresses,  and  the 
evident  counterpoises  ?  Moreover,  it  was  generally 
believed  that  the  art  of  constructing  vaulted  roofs 
was  lost,  never  to  be  found ;  and  there  were  stories 
of  some  saying  of  Wren  about  the  roof  of  King's  Col- 
lege Chapel.  The  apprehension  that  a  gust  of  wind 
might  one  day  blow  down  the  house  of  cards  told  on 
the  congregations  at  St.  Luke's,  which  were  thin  at 
first.  Everybody  who  went  there  had  roof  "  on  the 
brain,"  as  they  say. 

This  evening  there  was  a  large  congregation.  But 
the  service  was  restless.  Something  seemed  amiss. 
Sankey,  with  some  slight  defects  of  utterance,  preached 
a  very  good  and  impressive  sermon.  But  there  was 
an  intermittent  scuffle  going  on  somewhere,  and  once 
or  twice  Sankey  had  to  pause.  The  fact  was  the 
police  had  caught  a  vigorous  young  pickpocket,  and 
they  were  trying  to  drag  him  down  the  gallery  stairs. 
The  wretch  clutched  the  iron  banisters,  and  the  police 
pounded  his  knuckles  to  make  him  relax  his  hold ; 
"whereupon  he  squealed. 

At  the  conclusion  of  the  service  a  hymn  was  sung 
for  a  collection.  Unfortunately,  this  part  of  the  ar- 
rangement had  not  been  duly  communicated  to  the 
men  in  the  roof,  whose  business  it  was  to  let  down 
the  half  dozen  large  chandeliers  low  enough  for  the 


154 


REMINISCENCES. 


lights  to  be  put  out.  So  at  the  end  of  the  first  stave 
the  people  in  the  aisles  felt  the  chandeliers  coming 
down  on  their  heads,  and  jumped  out  of  the  way.  In 
so  doing  they  upset  the  benches.  The  congregation 
all  looked  that  way,  and  saw  the  chandeliers  low 
down,  and  people  moving  to  and  fro.  Heurtley  had 
taken  his  place  in  the  organ-loft,  and  now,  looking 
down,  saw  unmistakably  huge  stones  lying  all  about 
the  centre  gangway.  As  he  could  not  hope  to  escape 
by  the  stairs,  his  first  impulse  was  to  jump  down  to 
the  ground,  which  he  was  then  active  enough  to  have 
done  with  a  bare  chance  of  success.  Happily  second 
thoughts  prevailed.  Down-stairs  the  whole  congrega- 
tion sprang,  not  to  the  pew  doors,  but  across  the 
backs  of  the  seats,  bounding  with  amazing  activity 
from  one  back  to  another.  I  don't  think  any  one  of 
them  could  have  done  in  cold  blood  what  all  did  now. 
They  flew  like  fallen  leaves  in  autumn  suddenly 
caught  by  a  wind.  It  was  only  when  they  could  not 
get  nearer  the  doors  that  they  stopped,  and  found 
there  was  nothing  the  matter.  They  then  slowly  re- 
tired to  their  seats,  looking  rather  foolish. 

The  curate  who  had  said  prayers  was  still  in  the 
reading-desk,  which  was  in  fact  a  sister  pulpit,  the 
same  in  all  respects  as  the  other.  This,  it  must  be 
remembered,  was  several  years  before  the  Oxford 
movement,  and  already  there  was  a  strong  feeling 
that  preaching  had  been  unduly  elevated  in  compari- 
son with  the  prayers  and  the  reading  of  the  Script- 
ures. The  curate  thus  raised  to  an  equality  with  the 
preacher  was  a  very  tall  young  man,  of  course  in  the 
long  and  ample  surplice  of  tliose  days,  and  with  an 
Oxford  hood.  He  first  tried  to  open  the  door,  but 
could  not ;  the  beadle  had  shut  him  in  too  well.  So 


ST.  LUKE'S,  CHELSEA. 


155 


he  put  his  hand  on  the  side  of  the  reading-desk  and 
vaulted  over,  surplice,  hood,  and  all,  to  the  highest 
step  outside. 

I  was  in  the  pew  which  had  been  assigned  to  the 
preacher's  family,  and  Mrs.  Sankey  was  in  an  inter- 
esting condition.  Seeing  me  looking  on  quietly,  and 
her  husband  also  standing  unmoved  in  the  pulpit, 
she  turned  to  me  for  an  explanation  of  it  alL  As  I 
had  been  watching  the  chandeliers  from  the  time 
they  began  to  descend,  I  could  tell  her  it  was  a  false 
alarm,  and  I  would  n't  be  sure  I  did  n't  smile.  The 
hymn  was  resumed,  a  collection  made,  and  all  ended 
quietly. 

The  poor  gentleman  who  distinguished  himself  in 
the  reading-desk  sent  Dr.  Wellesley  next  morning  a 
humble  apology  for  the  feat.  Many  years  after,  I 
related  these  particulars  to  old  Mr.  Kingsley,  who 
had  heard  of  them,  but  was  glad  to  have  them  from 
an  eye-witness.  Either  he  or  the  present  Margaret 
Professor  told  me,  what  I  had  missed  at  the  time, 
that  when  the  curate  saw  there  was  no  danger,  and 
wished  to  resume  his  place  in  the  reading-desk,  again 
he  found  the  lock  too  much  for  him.  So  he  repeated 
the  performance.  Putting  his  hand  on  the  side,  he 
vaulted  in  again. 

Poor  Barry  !  What  a  life  he  led,  and  what  a  thing 
it  is  to  be  a  great  architect !  With  some  friends,  I 
went  with  him  over  the  unfinished  Houses  of  Parlia- 
ment. How  meekly  did  he  allude  to  his  troubles, 
his  difficulties,  and  his  vain  requests  !  What  a  deep 
sigh  did  he  heave  when  some  one  inconsiderately  ob- 
served it  was  a  pity  the  basement  line  was  not  a 
couple  of  yards  higher  out  of  the  mud,  and  out  of  the 
Thames  !    There  was  Westminster  Hall  in  the  way, 


156 


REMINISCENCES. 


one  of  the  things  that  Englishmen  still  worship.  Yet 
nothing  would  have  been  easier  than  to  screw,  or 
jDumjj  up,  the  whole  concern  any  number  of  yards; 
and  thus  the  hall  might  have  been  on  a  level  with 
the  principal  floor.  Then  there  was  the  biggest 
sewer  in  the  metropolis,  next  to  Fleet  Ditch,  passing 
directly  under  the  House  of  Lords.  Worse  than  all, 
there  was  that  impostor  Reid,  with  his  miles  of  ven- 
tilating tubes  piercing  everywhere  Barry's  masonry, 
wood,  and  iron,  costing  .£100,000,  and  unintelligible 
to  everybody,  —  it  was  believed  to  Reid  himself. 
Last  of  all  there  was  the  Select  Committee. 

It  appears  to  be  now  utterly  forgotten  that  Bai-ry 
fought  hard  for  space,  airiness,  height,  capacity,  and 
all  that  people  aye  now  crying  out  for.  He  wanted 
to  make  the  House  of  Commons  accommodate  com- 
fortably all  the  members,  and  two  or  three  hundred 
privileged  hearers  besides.  He  wanted  to  make  it, 
nay  he  did  make  it,  sixty  feet  high.  The  fear  of  the 
"  Mountain  "  oppressed  tlie  House  of  Commons.  The 
ghost  of  the  jealous,  exclusive,  unreformed  House 
still  haunted  the  site  and  possessed  the  officials. 
Wren,  with  all  his  troubles,  had  better  luck  with  his 
employers  than  Barry. 

And  what  was  Barry's  reward  ?  All  that  I  ever 
saw  of  it  was  the  flag  hoisted  half-mast  high,  the  first 
time  it  ever  was  hoisted,  the  day  after  his  death,  on 
the  "  Victoria  Tower."  Yet  even  that  much,  I  must 
admit,  was  worth  a  life  of  toil  and  pain. 


CHAPTER  XCVI. 


WILTON  CHURCH. 

When  I  became  Fellow,  and  for  some  years  after, 
there  sat  by  our  side  at  high  table  the  grandest  and 
most  interesting  historic  figure  then  at  Oxford. 
None  could  ever  forget  Sidney  Herbert,  a  head  and 
shoulders  taller  than  any  of  us,  with  large  soft  eyes, 
a  gentle  expression,  and  an  unmistakable  family  like- 
ness to  the  sainted  poet  of  Bemerton.  His  voice  and 
address  were  as  winning  as  his  looks.  I  do  not  think 
that  at  that  time  I  should  have  thought  him  the  man 
to  perform  an  important  part  in  the  administration 
of  a  great  war  a  long  way  off,  and  beset  with  unusual 
difficulties.  I  should  not  have  credited  him  with  the 
concentration  of  mind  and  singleness  of  purpose  nec- 
essary for  such  a  work. 

There  were  other  gentleman  commoners  at  the 
time  quite  comparable  to  him  in  family,  or  in  man- 
ners, or  in  abilities,  and,  upon  the  whole,  the  set  was 
a  considerable  improvement  on  that  which  I  found 
on  my  first  coming  to  Oxford.  Some  of  my  readers 
may  think  to  themselves.  What  an  advantage,  what 
an  opportunity,  what  a  pleasure,  what  a  school  of 
manners,  was  provided  in  this  association  of  young 
men  of  the  middle  classes  with  the  uppcn-  and  high- 
est of  all !  The  privilege  is  often  enumerated  among 
the  coveted  monopolies  of  the  old  English  Church 
universities.    Let  others  tell  how  the  arrangement 


158 


REMINISCENCES. 


worked  at  other  colleges.  At  Christcliurch  there 
was  the  ingenious  fiction  that  the  noblemen  and  gen- 
tleman commoners  dined  with  the  Dean  and  Chap- 
ter ;  but  as  that  sublime  body  was  never  there,  they 
had  the  upper  table  to  themselves.  The  students, 
comprising  the  Censor,  Tutors,  and  college  officers, 
swallowed  the  affront  comfortably  at  a  lower  table. 

The  working  of  the  enforced  companionship  at 
Oriel  was  that  the  Fellows  sat  together  at  the  top  of 
the  table,  and  had  their  own  talk  to  themselves.  The 
gentleman  commoners  sat  below  them,  without  an 
interval,  and  had  also  their  own  talk.  Now  and 
then  the  two  groups  would  interchange  a  question, 
or  a  remark,  or  a  piece  of  news,  with  civility.  Each 
group  must  have  felt  the  other  a  restraint  on  perfect 
freedom  of  conversation.  Listeners  who  are  not  talkers 
are  generally  a  nuisance,  and  are  more  or  less  open 
to  suspicion.  To  most  of  the  Fellows,  I  will  not  say 
to  all,  the  association  on  such  terms  was  most  dis- 
agreeable. Robert  Wilberforce  suggested  our  taking 
a  big  saw  and  cutting  the  high  table  in  two.  I  should 
conclude  that  Coplestone  had  positively  liked  the 
arrangement,  and  that  Hawkins  saw  no  reason  why 
it  should  be  given  up,  but  I  cannot  remember  who 
got  on  well  with  ihe  gentleman  commoners.  The 
Dean  and  senior  Fellows  had  a  comparatively  slight 
share  of  the  infliction,  sitting  as  they  did  quite  at  the 
head  of  the  table.  The  burden  of  the  day  fell  on  the 
poor  probationers,  or  last  elected  Fellows,  sitting  in 
the  immediate  neighborhood  of  these  scions  of  nobility. 

It  is  true  that  conversation  is  never  more  agree- 
able than  when  there  is  some  difference  of  character, 
education,  and  experience  ;  but  in  this  case  the  gulf 
was  immense,  and  there  might  be  no  bridge  over  it. 


WILTON  CHURCH. 


159 


A  young  nobleman  would  have  his  head  full  of 
country  sports,  the  fashionable  world  and  its  amuse- 
ments, county  families,  and  the  last  great  aristocratic 
scandal.  There  was  nothing  here  in  common  with 
the  youth  who  had  spent  several  years  over  his  books, 
and  whose  outdoor  amusement  had  been  his  daily 
constitutional.  The  arts  and  the  sciences  make  the 
bridge  between  the  classes,  and  they  are  to  be  recom- 
mended for  this  purpose,  if  for  this  purpose  only  ; 
but  I  cannot  remember  that  they  were  so  utilized,  to 
any  effect,  at  Oriel. 

For  reasons  I  was  never  quite  informed  of,  and 
on  which  Newman  never  dropped  a  word  to  me, 
there  ensued  a  great  coolness,  and  more  than  cool- 
ness, between  him  and  Sidney  Herbert.  I  never 
heard  anybody  express  surprise  at  that  fact,  or  hint 
that  Newman  was  to  blame  for  it.  Indeed,  if  New- 
man had  been  on  very  friendly  terms  with  Sidney 
Herbert,  the  college  would  have  thought  liim  much 
duped  or  very  easy-going.  I  do  not  think  tliat  on 
the  strength  of  dining  at  the  same  table  I  ever  ex- 
changed recognition  with  Sidney  Herbert,  out  of 
hall,  at  Oxford ;  and  I  am  certain  I  never  did  after- 
wards. In  town  I  frequently  met  him  in  the  streets, 
and  not  unfrequently  when  I  was  walking  with  a 
common  acquaintance,  with  whom  Sidney  Herbert 
made  a  point  of  having  some  talk;  but  even  then, 
though  I  had  to  stand  by,  our  eyes  never  met. 

We  were  fated,  however,  to  run  in  parallel  lines, 
and  not  to  be  quite  clear  of  one  another.  When  I 
went,  in  1836,  to  the  very  small  village  of  Cholderton, 
in  Salisbury  Plain,  I  was  but  a  walk  from  Wilton 
Abbey,  the  seat  of  the  Pembroke  family'.  Wilton 
itself  is  a  little  manufacturing  town.    Sidney  Herbert 


160  REMINISCENCES. 

and  I  conceived  at  the  same  time  the  idea  of  building 
new  churches.  We  both  chose  for  our  architect  Mr. 
T.  H.  Wyatt,  who  had  recently  been  appointed 
Diocesan  Architect ;  that  is,  adviser  of  a  Church 
Building  Board.  He  was  also  about  that  time  en- 
gaged by  Bishop  Denison  to  restore  the  cloisters  and 
the  Chapter  House,  the  latter  of  which  had  suffered 
much  by  old  storms  and  modern  neglect.  Sidney 
Herbert  and  I  had  both,  probably,  the  same  reasons 
for  our  choice.  We  both  intended  to  have  our  own 
way  as  much  as  possible,  and  make  a  convenience 
of  the  poor  architect.  We  both  expected  to  invite 
criticism,  perhaps  rebuke,  and  thought  that  a  man  so 
well  placed  as  Mr.  T.  H.  Wyatt  would  be  able  to 
smooth  matters  for  us,  and  carry  us  through  little 
difficulties.  Then  he  was  very  neutral  and  eclectic 
in  his  style,  condescending  sometimes  to  no  style  at 
all  when  his  patrons  were  so  inclined.  Of  course  I 
now  see  that  the  calculation  was  as  foolish  as  it 
proved  unsuccessful,  not  to  say  disastrous.  Perhaps 
I  suspected  as  much  then,  but  I  would  have  my  own 
waJ^ 

Sidney  Herbert's  first  idea  —  indeed  I  think  it  was 
that  which  put  church  building  into  his  head — was 
suggested  by  seeing  in  Portugal  a  beautiful  church 
in  the  gorgeous  Peninsular  style,  which  was  about  to 
be  demolished  as  no  longer  wanted.  His  notion  was 
to  take  it  down  carefully,  and  rebuild  it  stone  by 
stone  at  Wilton.  Wyatt  had  the  good  sense  and 
resolution  to  put  his  veto  on  that  project. 

The  next  idea  was  a  Romanesque  church,  with 
an  Italian  campanile.  But  as  the  general  plan  was 
to  be  that  of  an  old  English  church,  nave,  aisles, 
clerestory,  and  chancel,  the  Romanesque  character  of 


WILTON  CHURCH. 


161 


the  edifice  was  to  appear  in  the  details,  the  very 
point  in  which  Romanesque  is  rather  deficient.  So 
now  was  a  fresh  chance  for  foreign  importation. 
Sidney  Herbert  brought  from  South  Italy  an  im- 
mense quantity  of  Alexandrine  mosaics,  a  whole 
altar  of  it,  many  fine  twisted  columns  of  it,  and  some 
beautiful  large  columns  of  richly  colored  marble. 
The  Bishop  at  once  forbade  the  stone  altar,  so  the 
mosaics  had  to  be  worked  into  a  pulpit.  The  twisted 
pillars,  and  the  surplus  panels,  and  numerous  orna- 
ments, had  to  be  utilized  for  the  decoration  of  side 
doors,  and  wherever  a  use  for  them  could  be  found. 

I  never  knew  the  full  moaning  of  that  horrid 
word  "  bedizen  "  till  I  visited  the  church  a  few  years 
since,  so  utterly  incongruous  are  all  these  details 
with  the  otherwise  dull  and  colorless  .interior.  The 
Bishop  had  rather  rigorously  forbidden  color  in  the 
ceiling,  and  I  think  too  on  the  walls.  As  for  the  cam- 
panile it  was  unfortunate  that  every  Wiltshire  person 
saw,  on  his  arrival  at  Nine  Elms  Station,  a  much 
handsomer  one  attached  to  some  manufactory.  Sid- 
ney Herbert  was  a  long  time  about  the  church,  and 
it  was  said  to  cost  him  and  his  mother  near  i£ 30,000. 

I  need  not  say  that  he  did  better  things  than 
that  church,  and  that  upon  the  whole  he  has  left  a 
good  mark  on  the  annals  of  his  country  ;  but  every 
Oriel  man,  without  a  moment's  hesitation,  sets  down 
the  redeeming  features  of  his  unhappily  brief  career 
to  the  influence  of  Newman,  surrounding  him  and 
penetrating  him,  in  spite  of  a  wilful  and  stubborn 
resistance,  and  asserting  possession  of  him  in  due 
time. 

VOL.  II.  11 


CHAPTER  XCVIL 


COMIMENCEMENT  OF  CHOLDEKTON  CHURCH. 

The  church  I  found  at  Cholderton  in  1836  is  cor- 
rectly described  in  Sir  Richai'd  Colt  Hoare's  mag- 
nificent work  on  the  county  of  Wilts  as  very  small 
and  mean.  The  dimensions  were  forty  by  sixteen ; 
the  slab  of  the  communion  table  was  a  foot  below 
the  surface  of  the  ground  outside ;  the  walls  were  very 
shaky,  and  eastwards  quite  green ;  the  lighting  was 
bad  and  supplemented  by  a  skylight.  People  sat 
during  the  sermon  not  only  on  the  communion  rail 
and  the  step  before  it,  but  on  the  table  itself, and  said 
they  had  no  other  place  to  go  to.  Mj  predecessor, 
Walter  Blunt,  was  a  hunting  and  shooting  man,  and, 
like  all  hunting  men,  "  drew."  As  the  butcher's  wife 
at  my  former  living,  the  good-looking  mother  of  four 
handsome  daughters,  once  observed  to  me,  country 
parishes  want  men,  not  angels,  to  preach  to  them. 
Half-filled  pews  occupied  half  the  church,  though 
there  existed  an  award,  made  in  the  Commonwealth, 
putting  the  men  on  one  side,  the  women  on  the 
other,  and  their  servants  lower  down,  thei'o  being  at 
that  time  enough  space  for  all. 

My  visitors  chaffed  me  on  my  church,  and  made 
invidious  comparisons  between  it  and  the  new  rectory, 
which  I  had  enlarged  for  pupils.  All  the  foolish 
things  I  had  ever  said  or  listened  to  about  smug 
parsons  and  snug  parsonages  were  now  visited  upon 


COMMENCEMENT  OF  CHOLDERTON  CHURCH.  163 


me.  Something  must  be  done,  and  when  I  had 
pupils  I  could  not  say  I  wanted  the  means.  More- 
over, the  churches  all  about  were  in  a  bad  state,  and 
I  -was  there  to  set  an  example.  I  can  honestly  say  it 
was  not  a  spontaneous  act.  I  have  been  an  incum- 
bent altogether  twenty-eight  years,  and  I  never  yet 
had  any  of  the  luxuries  of  worship.  I  never  had 
a  vesti-y,  or  a  stove,  or  a  candle,  or  an  organ,  or  a 
painted  window.  I  have  always  "  robed,"  as  I  have 
often  seen  the  Pope  do,  in  the  sight  of  the  congi-ega- 
tion.  I  was  quite  content  with  the  church  as  it  was, 
if  only  the  congregation  themselves  would  manage 
to  make  th(^  poor  little  barn  really  available,  and  my 
own  very  kind  friends  would  be  so  good  as  to  leave 
me  alone.  Having  once  begun,  I  was  as  wild  as  any 
of  them. 

Like  my  magnificent  neighbor,  so  near  and  yet 
so  far,  so  different  in  most  respects,  I  too  began  with 
the  idea  of  bringing  across  the  seas  not  indeed  a 
whole  church,  but  the  entire  roof  of  an  ancient  church. 
This  too  I  actually  did. 

It  must  have  been  early  in  1839  that  Samuel 
Rickards,  happening  to  meet  Chevallier  Cobbold, 
M.  P.  for  Suffolk,  heard  him  mention  an  ancient  oak 
roof  of  a  highly  ornamental  character,  then  lying  on 
the  quay  at  Ipswich,  and  to  be  got  cheap.  It  had 
been  over  a  municipal  building  belonging  to  the 
corporation,  but  had  probably  been  originally  over 
the  clerestory  of  some  conventual  church  destroyed 
at  the  Reformation.  I  caught  at  the  opportunity. 
Coming  by  sea,  by  canal,  and  by  turnpike  road,  it 
arrived  at  Cholderton  one  very  hot  day,  perfuming 
the  pure  air  with  mediaeval  fustiness,  and  eliciting 
from  the  workmen  on  the  spot,  "  Old  work  and  new 


164 


REMINISCENCES. 


work  never  agree."  With  it  there  came  a  little  colony 
of  Ipswich  wood-carvers  and  carpenters,  one  of  whom 
shortly  set  about  to  disabuse  my  parishioners  of 
what  faith  they  had  in  Holy  Writ.  Possibly  my 
bringing  this  huge  idol  so  far  and  building  a  tem- 
ple for  it,  did  not  raise  his  estimate  of  sacred  tradi- 
tion. 

I  built  a  large  working-shed  for  the  colony.  The 
profane  people  who  three  hundred  years  before  liad 
removed  the  roof  from  a  church  to  a  less  solid 
building  —  banqueting  hall  or  storehouse  none  could 
say  —  replaced  with  vulgar  tie-beams  every  alternate 
pair  of  hammer-beams  and  spandrils.  We  must  have 
no  tie-beams ;  and  we  must  have  spandrils  as  good  as 
the  old  ones,  each  carved  out  of  one  piece  of  oak. 
So  my  chief  Suffolk  wood-carver  went  to  the  New 
Forest  and  brought  back  a  monarch  of  the  woods, 
who,  I  had  afterwards  reason  to  suspect,  had  been 
rejected  by  the  Portsmouth  dock-yard  authorities, 
and  had  lain  a  long  time  waiting  for  a  less  critical 
purchaser.  We  found  him  very  "  foxy  "  when  we  cut 
through  him,  but  he  had  cost  me  more  than  thirty 
pounds. 

The  roof  fixed  the  proportions  of  the  church.  It 
was  80  feet  long,  and  of  course  I  could  sacrifice 
nothing  of  it.  Though  we  coaxed  out  of  it  a  few 
inches  more  breadth,  we  could  not  get  more  than 
20  feet,  6  inches.  What  did  I  not  sacrifice  to  this 
dumb  idol !  It  was  in  ten  lengths,  very  proper  for 
small  clerestory  windows,  but  not  to  be  adjusted  to 
any  reasonable  number  of  moderate-sized  windows 
proper  for  a  village  church.  So  we  had  to  raise  the 
roof  and  its  deep  spandrils  to  a  height  clear  of  the 
windows  altogether. 


COMMENCEMENT  OF  CHOLDEETON  CHURCH,  165 


It  then  became  a  serious  question  what  kind  of 
windows  we  should  have  under  these  rigorous,  self- 
imposed  conditions.  I  searched  through  all  my 
architectural  library,  to  which  I  had  added  a  good 
deal  since  W.  J.  Coplestone's  fatal  gift,  and  I  scoured 
the  country  far  and  wide.  At  last  I  found  what  I 
wanted  in  the  windows  of  Old  Basing  church,  where 
I  spent  two  days  taking  drawings  and  dimensions. 
As  they  stood  there,  with  a  very  graceful  open  roof 
over  them,  I  thought  myself  safe  as  to  the  period, 
but  Mr.  Parker,  of  Oxford,  maintains  that  my  roof 
required  "Decorated"  windows.  My  windows,  in 
regard  to  their  breadth,  I  hoped  might  be  considered 
Transitional,  but  he  does  not  admit  that  they  are.  It 
is  very  much  the  question,  "  Is  Westminster  Hall, 
1399,  Decox'ated  or  Perpendicular  ?  " 

I  forget  at  what  exact  stage  of  the  affair  I  put  the 
case  before  Oriel  College  and  asked  for  aid,  but  I 
was  pretty  deep  in  it.  As  the  Provost's  line  is  espe- 
cially common  sense,  fitness,  justness,  and  proportion, 
one  can  hardly  conceive  a  greater  outrage  than  ask- 
ing him  to  sanction  so  monstrous  a  design.  He 
wrote  imploring  me  to  get  rid  of  my  roof  and  be- 
gin de  novo.  He  might  as  well  have  talked  to  Stone- 
henge.  The  college  behaved  handsomely,  and  so  did 
many  other  people. 

I  am  forced  to  omit  several  long  chapters  of 
troubles,  sufficient  to  fill  a  volume,  and  not  perti- 
nent to  the  comparison  I  have  ventured  to  make  be- 
tween my  own  work  and  Sidney  Herbert's.  In  three 
years  all  my  own  money,  with  the  subscriptions,  was 
gone;  the  roof,  which  had  now  cost  near  ,£1,000, 
was  finished  and  shedded  ;  the  walls  were  up  to 
half  the  height  of  the  windows,  and  tiled  to  keep 


166 


EEMINISCENCES. 


them  dry ;  and  there  I  stood,  penniless,  but,  as  it 
were,  with  my  back  to  the  wall,  ready  to  face  all  ad- 
versities. 

Adversities  had  come  and  were  coming,  some  seri- 
ous, others  of  the  sort  that  frighten  rather  than  hurt. 
For  two  months  a  notorious  poacher  held  us  all  at 
bay.  He  had  been  turned  out  of  cottage  after  cot- 
tage, and  driven  from  village  to  village,  rieither  farm- 
ers nor  landlords  wanting  in  their  neighborhood  a 
man  who  made  as  free  with  poultry  as  with  game. 
He  had  induced  a  very  simple  shepherd  to  give  him 
and  his  family  shelter,  but  had  received  notice  to 
quit.  One  morning,  on  our  going  to  the  usual  week- 
day service  at  the  church,  we  found  Job  Phillijjs,  his 
wife,  and  four  children  in  possession  of  the  church 
porch.  He  had  heard  the  old  saying  that  if  a  man 
cannot  get  shelter  elsewhere  in  his  own  parish,  he  has 
a  right  to  it  in  the  church.  With  sail-cloth  he  had 
made  the  small  porch  really  a  very  comfortable  apart- 
ment, though  it  was  very  cold  weather.  On  Sun- 
day he  left  a  very  sufficient  gangway.  I  went  to  the 
churchwarden.  He  declined  to  interfere,  for  he  had 
many  hundreds  of  pounds'  worth  of  property  lying 
about,  that  a  match  would  destroy  in  an  hour.  The 
policeman  said  I  must  give  the  man  in  charge.  In 
that  case,  woe  to  my  roof,  then  within  a  few  yards, 
and  already  jeopardized  by  the  man's  arrangements 
for  boiling  his  kettle.  After  many  talks  with  him,  I 
convinced  him  that  he  had  no  chance  here,  and  had 
better  emigrate.  We  raised  £20  or  £S0,  and  sent 
them  off  to  Canada.  A  child  died  on  the  voyage 
from  a  cold  caught  in  the  church  porch.  From  time 
to  time  we  had  letters  from  the  man,  thanking  us  all 
for  being  the  making  of  him.    He  carried  his  gun 


COMMENCEMENT  OF  CHOLDERTON  CHURCH.  167 


always  with  bim  ;  lie  had  shot  several  bears  ;  and  he 
had  met  no  —  policeman. 

What  tales  may  be  told  of  the  churches  then  be- 
ginning to  rise  everywhere  over  the  land,  or  to  show 
a  new  face  !  Some  of  these  stories  are  far  sadder 
than  mine,  for  at  least  I  live  to  tell  it.  In  April, 
May,  and  June,  1843,  I  was  here,  at  a  place  where 
Sydney  Smith  would  have  perished  of  isolation  in  a 
week.  My  wife  was  in  ill  health,  and  was  visiting 
kind  friends  far  away.  My  only  servant  was  the 
gardener,  who  had  come  into  the  parsonage.  I  was 
in  debt  on  the  church  account,  most  of  all  to  the  vil- 
lage blacksmith,  poor,  good  man,  who  told  me  twenty 
years  after  that  he  would  have  died  befoi-e  he  asked 
me  for  the  money.  I  was  living  on  bread,  butter, 
cheese,  and  garden  stuff  for  a  quarter  of  a  year. 
Under  these  circumstances  and  on  this  diet,  I  wrote 
the  article  on  the  Six  Doctors,  in  the  "  British 
Critic,"  seventy  pages  long,  actually  beating  Ward's 
that  number.  To  this  day  I  am  confident  that  the 
article  was  a  true  exposition  of  the  law,  and  that  the 
suspension  of  Pusey  as  a  preacher  was  an  illegal  and 
violent  act.  I  have  to  admit,  however,  that  I  might 
have  qualified  some  expressions  had  I  known  at  the 
time  that  Pusey  had  been  for  a  long  period  absenting 
himself  from  the  University  sermons,  excusable  as 
that  course  might  be  in  his  case. 

But  to  proceed  with  the  labors  of  that  weary 
time.  Looking  through  Wai'd's  articles  to  see  that 
he  was  not  sending  us  all  quite  into  space  was  itself 
an  anxious  affair.  I  had  also  to  get  up  what  spirit  I 
had  for  the  "  Notices."  Not  to  add  to  my  troubles,  I 
resolved  to  be  kind  to  everybody,  and  consequently 
had  a  little  bill  presented  to  me  for  having  misled  a 


168 


REMINISCENCES. 


clergyman  into  purchasing  Moultrie's  "  Poems  "  on  a 
very  exaggerated  representation  of  their  merits.  But 
the  clergyman  himself,  I  should  say,  was  a  not  very 
successful  ^Yriter  of  verses.  How  is  it,  by  the  bye, 
that  while  great  poets  can  recognize  the  divine  gift  in 
the  humblest  of  their  race,  mediocre  poets  are  always 
very  sharp  on  one  another?  Is  it  that  poetry  is  only 
a  form  of  love  ? 

The  Bishops  were  now  firing  off  their  charges. 
My  own  Bishop  had  fired  his,  and  I  was  on  my  good 
behavior. 

But  for  my  unfinished  church,  with  walls  half  high 
and  roof  laid  up  in  a  shed,  I  had  an  offer  of  assist- 
ance. By  the  pathway  to  the  church  lived  the  chief 
mouser  and  rat-killer  in  the  county,  a  man  who  was 
sent  for  forty  miles  in  every  direction  to  clear  wheat 
ricks  and  farmyards  of  vermin.  He  had  amassed 
j£l,200,  and  he  offered  me  half  on  my  personal  secu- 
rity. But  he  was  a  loose  fellow  and  a  bit  of  a  black- 
guard, even  in  the  village  estimation,  and  I  declined. 
My  workmen  at  the  church  had  had  their  jokes  about 
him,  and  he  had  to  keep  a  little  out  of  their  way. 
Being  a  big  fellow,  and  carrj-ing  his  own  height  well, 
he  was  critical  as  to  presence  and  the  want  of  it. 
Though  a  married  man,  he  had  been  overheard  ad- 
dressing a  3'oung  woman,  then  a  near  neiglibor, 
"  Thee 'd  be  a  good-looking  lass,  if  thee  was  but 
straight,"  which  was  true  enough,  for  she  was  in  all 
respects  a  poor  limp  thing.  But  he  never  heard  the 
end  of  it. 

All  this  time  I  had  a  companion  in  trouble  in  the 
Bishop  himself.  On  the  strength  of  the  episcopal 
revenue  turning  out  better  than  he  had  been  led  to 
expect,  he  embarked  in  the  restoration  of  the  Clois- 


COMMENCEMENT  OF  CHOLDEETON  CHURCH.  169 


ters  and  of  the  Chapter  House.  By  the  time  the 
latter  was  full  of  scaffolding,  and  much  expense  had 
been  incurred,  he  began  to  have  qualms  about  the 
undertaking  and  misgivings  as  to  his  architect.  With 
much  em})liasis  he  asked  me  one  day  my  opinion  of 
Mr.  Wyatt.  Any  number  of  answers  passed  rapidly 
through  my  mind.  I  had  no  call  to  give  any  answer 
at  all,  for  I  was  employing  Wyatt,  and  was  in  confi- 
dential relations  with  him.  I  had  not  used  him  well. 
I  had  employed  him,  not  because  I  trusted  him,  but 
because  I  trusted  myself.  I  had  not  given  him  a 
chance.  I  was  making  him  my  scapegoat  and  both- 
ering him  a  good  deal  too.  I  believe  I  replied  that  I 
thought  Wyatt  a  good  and  safe  arcliitect,  and  that 
would  be  suflBciently  true.  I  heard  not  long  after 
that  the  Bishop  had  called  in  Salvin,  and  from  that  I 
concluded  that  Salvin  would  finish  the  work.  But  I 
do  not  find  it  in  the  very  full  and  particular  account 
of  Salvin's  works  published  in  the  "  Builder  "  soon 
after  his  death. 

The  character  of  that  work  illustrates  the  difficul- 
ties bequeathed  to  us  by  our  venturesome  forefathers. 
The  Chapter  House,  lightly  framed,  all  windows,  in- 
adequately buttressed,  and  originally  surmounted  by 
a  tall  extinguisher  roof,  had  yielded  to  the  wind  and 
gone  quite  half  a  yard  out  of  the  perpendicular. 
More  than  a  third  of  the  weight  of  the  vaulting,  not 
far  from  a  hundred  tons,  rested  on  the  central  pillar, 
and  a  plumb  line  dropped  from  the  capital  of  that 
pillar  fell  half  a  yard  from  its  base.  It  looked  very 
ill,  and  could  not  be  called  quite  safe.  The  original 
architect,  knowing  the  extreme  weakness  of  his  walls 
and  his  want  of  lateral  supports,  had  cunningly  de- 
vised the  vaulting  so  as  to  throw  as  much  of  the 


170 


REMINISCENCES. 


weight  as  possible  on  tliis  pillar,  which  now  looked 
the  very  emblem  of  weakness.  The  only  thing  to 
be  done  was  to  support  the  vaulting  with  wood- 
work, and  rebuild  the  pillar  from  a  new  foundation 
directly  under  the  capital.  This  was  done  in  the 
end. 


CHAPTER  XCVIIL 


COMPLETION  OF  CHOLDERTON  CHURCH. 

At  last  the  means  came  in  an  unexpected  way  and 
from  an  unexpected  quarter,  and  the  church  was 
finished  and  consecrated  in  1850.  I  had  then  given 
up  tlie  living  three  years.  I  had  spent  on  the  new 
church  more  than  £5,000  of  my  own  earnings,  every 
pound  of  it  spent  before  it  was  earned,  never  really  in 
my  possession,  but  not  the  less  paying  income-tax  for 
it.  My  temper  I  know  is  not  perfect,  and  therefore 
I  do  not  wonder  that  it  was  a  little  tried  when,  after 
I  had  made  out  my  case,  with  a  full  statement  of 
quantities,  properly  signed,  for  remission  of  the  duties 
on  the  brick,  timber,  and  glass,  the  official  at  the 
Queen  Anne's  Bounty  Office,  through  which  it  had 
to  pass,  replied  shortly  that  I  had  been  too  long  about 
the  church,  and  they  could  not  recommend  the  case  to 
the  Treasury. 

The  college,  my  own  friends,  and  Newman's,  in- 
cluding the  present  Lord  Chancellor,  subscribed  very 
liberally.  Several  of  the  writers  for  the  "  British 
Critic  "  sent  to  the  church  the  cliecks  they  received 
from  the  publisher.  But  the  total  so  raised,  though 
suffit;ient  for  a  church  in  proportion  to  the  village, 
was  a  trifle  compared  with  the  actual  expenditure, 
which  was  over  £6,000.  But  I  must  have  everything 
in  keeping  with  my  roof,  after  all  stilted  so  high  that 
its  ornaments  and  even  its  framework  are  hardly  dis- 


172 


REMINISCENCES. 


cernible.  There  must  be  a  handsome  stone  plinth 
outside,  and  an  elaborate  cornice.  The  seats,  done 
by  my  Suffolk  carvers,  are  of  solid  oak,  everj^  one 
with  its  own  ornamentation.  They  cost  more  than 
five  guineas  a  sitting.  The  encaustic  tiling  was  so 
carefully  designed  and  so  costly  that  Minton  exhib- 
ited a  full-sized  plan  of  it  at  the  Hyde  Park  Exhibi- 
tion. My  wood-carvers  were  very  desirous  to  have 
a  chancel  screen  and  roodloft,  which  would  have 
relieved  the  inordinate  length  of  the  building,  and 
made  a  chancel,  which  was  not  otherwise  distin- 
guished in  the  plan.  But  the  Bishop  had  early 
declared  against  a  chancel  screen,  as  also  against  a 
stone  altar,  a  piscina,  and  a  credence  table.  I  had 
been  earl}^  forewarned  that  the  Uist  would  not  be 
allowed,  and  had  therefore  thought  no  more  about  it. 
When,  thei-efore,  the  Bishop  asked  me  one  day  what 
I  understood  by  a  credence  table,  or  prothesis,  I  was 
taken  aback,  and  had  nothing  to  say,  except  that  I 
was  not  going  to  have  one.  To  console  the  stone- 
masons, we  had  a  stone  screen  separating  the  west 
end  of  the  interior  into  a  vestibule,  and  adorned  with 
tracery,  armorial  bearings,  and  initials.  The  whole 
of  the  stonework  of  the  church  came  ready  cut  from 
Tisbury,  twenty-seven  miles  off,  except  the  bosses, 
corbels,  and  other  ornaments,  which  were  done  by 
stone-carvers  from  Wilton  church. 

Of  the  numerous  carvings,  including  some  creatures 
on  the  standards  supporting  the  benches,  possibly  by 
this  time  credited  with  a  mystic  significance,  I  have 
a  story  to  tell.  Early  in  1843  I  had  written  to  New- 
man asking  him  what  he  would  say  if  he  found  an 
article  in  favor  of  Free  Trade  in  the  ."British  Critic." 
His  reply  was  that  it  was  a  matter  to  which  he  had 


COMPLETION  OF  CHOLDERTON  CHURCH.  173 


given  no  attention,  and  he  must  leave  it  to  me.  I 
had  been  reading  Dr.  Cooke  Taylor's  "  Tour  through 
the  Manufacturing  Towns  of  Lancashire,"  beginning 
with  a  faint  prejudice  in  favor  of  protection  and  end- 
ing with  strong  convictions  against  it. 

Perhaps  other  feelings  contributed  to  this  change. 
My  old  illusions  of  a  paternal  system  had  been  tested 
by  facts,  and  had  now  vanislied  away.  Under  the 
New  Poor  Law,  with  which  the  landowners  were  well 
content,  some  of  my  poor  parishioners,  in  spite  of  my 
remonstrances,  were  hurried  off  to  Andover  Union, 
there  quickly  to  rot  and  die.  It  was  the  workhouse 
in  which  the  aged  paupers,  set  to  break  the  horse- 
bones  from  Mr.  Assheton  Smith's  dog-kennels,  first 
gnawed  and  sucked  them.  The  flavor  of  the  bones  I 
know,  for  I  often  passed  them  on  their  way  to 
Andover.  It  was  not  pleasant.  Then  for  the  church. 
Here  I  was  in  the  greatest  difficulties  with  a  work 
which  none  could  deny  to  be  necessary,  even  though 
I  might  be  overdoing  it.  Two  landowners  divided 
my  parish,  and  not  one  would  give  me  the  least  help. 
More  I  will  not  now  say,  for  one  of  them  contributed 
to  the  Church  of  England  one  of  its  warmest  and 
most  active  friends,  the  present  Earl  Nelson.  It  is 
of  my  feelings  at  that  time  that  I  am  speaking,  and  I 
did  then  feel  a  deep  grievance  with  the  British  land- 
ocracy. What  are  they  made  for,  I  said,  and  why 
are  they  to  be  favored  and  supported  at  the  cost  of 
all  other  classes,  if  they  are  to  do  nothing  for  it,  and 
be  just  as  stingy  and  selfish  as  the  rest  ? 

Before  the  year  was  ended  a  cliange  had  come  over 
my  scene,  and  I  was  now  fighting  in  the  ranks  of 
philanthropy  and  common  sense.  I  was  soon  able  to 
speak  for  Free  Trade  to  more  effect  than  I  could  have 


174 


REMINISCENCES. 


done  in  the  "  British  Critic  ; "  I  had  my  saj^  and  I 
said  it.  As  that  cause,  in  a  way,  contributed  to  the 
completion  of  the  edifice,  so  I  -wished  it  to  be  a  mon- 
ument of  its  success.  The  fruits  of  the  earth  are 
there  along  the  cornice  outside,  and  in  other  places. 
Two  large  bosses  at  the  west  entrance  were  left  to  the 
last.  I  wished  one  to  be  carved  into  a  mass  of  divers 
kinds  of  grain  and  pulse,  and  the  other  into  a  ship,  to 
denote  the  repeal  of  the  Navigation  Laws.  Wyatt 
dissuaded  me  from  this,  and  they  are  simply  masses  of 
conventional  foliage.  He  had  no  confidence  in  the 
old  roof,  and  made  me  bind  every  "  truss  "  with  iron 
bolts  bonding  the  woodwork.  I  also  was  a  little 
afraid  that  the  walls,  albeit  a  yard  thick,  might  bulge 
here  and  there,  as  may  be  seen  in  many  Suffolk 
churches.  Accordingly  I  had  thick  bars  of  iron 
hooked  into  one  another,  buried  in  the  masonry  over 
the  windows  from  end  to  end. 

Open  roofs  are  liable  to  one  of  two  defects.  If  the 
angle  is  sharp  enough  to  please  the  eye  outside,  the 
valley  is  too  deep  and  dark  inside.  On  the  other 
hand,  if  the  angle  is  not  so  sharp,  say  a  right  angle, 
or  less,  while  the  interior  is  brought  more  within 
reach  of  the  eye,  the  exterior  is  not  pleasing.  The 
roof  in  my  case  was  neither  high  nor  low,  which  is 
like  water  neither  hot  nor  cold.  Outside,  therefore, 
my  Suffolk  roof  I  had  a  light  fir  roof  rising  to  a 
higher  pitch.  At  St.  Paul's  there  are  two  domes,  one 
for  outer  effect,  the  other  for  inside.  They  are  of  dif- 
ferent shapes  as  well  as  sizes. 

As  the  additional  churchyard  required  for  the  new 
building  was  most  of  it  a  chalk  pit,  I  had  to  obtain, 
as  well  as  I  could,  fifteen  hundred  loads  of  material  to 
fill  it.    This  I  could  not  get  near  at  hand.    So,  "  to 


COJIPLETION  OF  CHOLDERTON  CHURCH.  175 


kill  two  birds  with  one  stone,"  I  reduced  the  decliv- 
ity of  a  road  leading  out  of  Wiltshire  into  Hamp- 
shire, half  a  mile  off.  Such  were  the  conditions  of 
that  remote  place  that  all  this  time  I  was  obliged  to 
have  my  own  horses,  carts,  and  other  appliances. 

Very  early  after  assenting  to  the  plans,  the  Bishop 
had  observed  to  me  that  I  was  about  to  leave  my  mon- 
ument in  the  diocese.  I  felt  it  rather  as  a  rebuke. 
In  that  sense  it  was  half  deserved,  but  I  was  carried 
away  by  an  enthusiasm  I  could  not  control.  The 
Bishop,  I  must  say,  watched  my  operations  in  every 
stage  with  a  kindly  interest,  and,  like  the  rest  of  the 
world,  wished  to  see  them  completed.  It  must  have 
been  rather  late  in  1846  that  he  asked  me  when  I  pro- 
posed to  roof  in  my  church.  "  In  October,"  I  said. 
"  Is  not  that  apt  to  be  an  unsettled  month  ?  "  he  re- 
joined. To  this  I  replied  that  it  was  usually  said 
there  were  eighteen  fine  days  in  October,  or  eighteen 
days  in  which  one  could  do  without  a  fire.  "  But  how 
do  you  interpret  that  saying  ?  "  he  asked  ;  adding,  "  I 
interpret  it  to  mean  that  the  month  is  genei'ally  rainy, 
but  that  you  may  manage  to  pick  out  eighteen  sun- 
shiny days."    I  believe  he  was  right. 

I  wrote  long  articles  in  the  "  British  Critic,"  illus- 
trated with  a  great  number  of  cuts  of  open  roofs,  with 
their  proper  mouldings.  I  had  drawings  made  of 
thirty  or  forty  Suffolk  roofs  in  particular,  and  what  I 
wrote  had  probably  a  great  share  in  setting  the  fash- 
ion since  become  universal,  for  no  one  thinks  of  a  flat 
ceiled  roof  in  these  days.  Open  roofs  are  not  with- 
out their  disadvantages,  but  few  people  now  care  to 
be  told  what  they  are.  They  tell,  however,  in  the 
church  accounts.  A  church  with  a  lofty  open  roof 
cannot  be  so  quickly  or  so  easily  warmed  as  one  with 


176 


REMINISCENCES. 


a  ceiling  at  a  low  level,  and  cannot  retain  the  heat  so 
long.  Fortunately,  we  have  now  better  methods  of 
warming,  and  coals  are  generally  cheaper  than  they 
used  to  be. 

Church  architects  have  now  greatly  improved  on 
the  Westminster  Hall  roof,  or  rather  they  have  con- 
fined themselves  to  some  other  forms  of  equal  antiq- 
uity, and  to  be  found  in  the  above  articles  of  the 
"  British  Critic."  They  have  either  abandoned  the 
"  hammer-beam  "  as  it  is  called,  altogether,  or  they 
have  used  it  just  sufficiently  to  stiffen  the  wooden 
arch.  The  arch  itself,  if  it  be  fairly  stout  and  prop- 
erly stayed,  and  if  it  spring  sufficiently  low,  is  at  once 
the  strength  and  the  beauty  of  the  open  roof. 

I  may  mention  three  very  flattering  testimonies  to 
my  church,  with  all  its  manifold  imperfections.  The 
Bishop's  coachman  said  he  had  been  with  his  master 
at  many  consecrations,  and  had  never  seen  a  new 
church  he  liked  so  much  as  this.  I  was  succeeded  at 
Cholderton  by  the  present  Bishop  of  Manchester,  who 
took  such  interest  in  the  church  as  to  fill  it  with 
painted  glass,  adding  much  to  its  beauty,  and  produc- 
ing an  almost  magical  effect.  The  painted  glass  of 
the  west  window  is  reflected  down  upon  the  plate 
glass  of  the  screen,  and  from  it  to  the  eyes  as  one 
enters  the  church.  What  you  see  is  really  the  window 
over  your  head,  but  it  has  the  effect  of  a  glorious  vis- 
ion among  the  timbers  of  the  dark  roof  far  in  advance 
of  you. 

The  third  testimony  is  even  more  remarkable.  I 
was  but  three  miles  from  Tidworth,  where  was  the 
famous  house  of  the  "  Tidworth  drummer,"  and  im- 
mense stables  and  kennels.  The  old  church  had  been 
taken  down,  and  a  very  homely  chapel-like  structure 


COMPLETION  OF  CHOLDERTON  CHURCH.  177 


built,  less  in  the  way.  During  Assheton  Smith's  life- 
time I  met  with  no  admirution  in  that  quai'ter.  In- 
deed my  big,  pretentious,  unfinished  church  was  a 
standing  joke  in  the  hunting  field.  But  immediately 
on  his  death  his  widow  set  about  building  a  church 
which  might  not  be  so  far  behind  Cholderton.  She 
died  in  a  very  few  months,  when  there  happened  the 
very  rare  event  of  a  church  begun,  not  completed, 
and  the  unfinished  building,  with  the  collected  mate- 
rials, sold  by  auction.  The  executors  had  no  funds, 
they  said,  for  the  work.  This  was,  however,  in  the 
order  of  Providence  only  a  recoil  for  a  rebound. 
There  has  lately  been  erected  on  a  better  site, 
nearer  Tidworth  House,  one  of  the  most  beautiful 
churches  in  the  country,  sharing,  I  fear,  with  my 
church,  the  fault,  for  such  it  is,  of  being  out  of  pro- 
portion to  the  parish  and  to  the  rustic  congregation. 

Some  of  the  Bisliop's  ti'oubles  began  when  mine 
were  well  over.  He  had  been  encouraged  to  begin 
his  works  at  the  Chapter  House,  the  Cloisters,  and 
the  Palace,  besides  being  generally  open-handed,  by 
finding  the  receipts  of  the  see  for  several  years  much 
more  than  he  had  been  led  to  expect.  To  myself  it 
"was  a  very  painful  matter.  During  the  debates  on 
the  Bill  for  regulating  Episcopal  Incomes,  a  great 
fight  had  been  made  by  Conservative  Churchmen  that 
the  income  should  not  be  paid  in  money  by  the  Com- 
missioners, but  should  be  the  rent  of  such  a  portion 
of  the  episcopal  estates  as  might  be  safely  expected 
to  produce  that  sum.  They  carried  their  point.  Ac- 
cordingly, when  Denison  went  to  Salisbury  he  found 
certain  estates  already  reserved  for  the  source  of  his 
income.  He  was  immediately  beset  by  officials,  sur- 
vej^ors,  Chapter  folks,  and  all  the  good  people  of 

VOL.  II.  *  .12 


178 


REMINISCENCES. 


Salisbury,  who  assured  him  the  estates  were  not  ade- 
quate to  that  purpose,  and  that  the  episcopal  revenue 
would  fall  below  the  mark.  They  were  all  on  the 
spot ;  they  knew  the  property  and  its  vicissitudes. 
It  was  a  matter  in  which  the  city  and  diocese,  more 
than  he,  were  concerned.  So  he  allowed  himself  to 
fight  their  battle.  In  leases  upon  lives  there  must 
always  be  uncertaint^^  It  so  happened  that  before 
long  several  years  produced  seven  or  eight  thousand 
pounds  instead  of  the  regulation  five.  The  excess, 
however,  was  speedily  absorbed  by  the  costly  works 
I  have  mentioned,  and  might  itself  give  place  to  a 
deficiency  in  future  years.  However,  the  Whigs  and 
Church  reformers,  remembering  the  battle  about  the 
settlement  of  the  incomes,  pounced  on  the  scandal,  as 
they  called  it.  The  Bishop,  they  said,  hiid  lent  him- 
self to  an  organized  depreciation  of  the  episcopal 
estates  in  order  to  obtain  a  better  income,  and  was 
now  profiting  by  a  species  of  fraud.  He  ought  to 
refund. 

At  that  time,  I  believe,  Denison  would  not  have 
found  it  easy  to  I'efund.  Knowing,  as  I  did,  the 
pressui-e  put  upon  him,  I  cannot  doubt  he  had  acted 
simply  in  the  whole  matter.  There  was,  too,  by  this 
time,  another  consideration  presenting  itself  with 
daily  increasing  force.  All  the  arrangements  made 
at  that  period  more  or  less  cut  away  the  resources  for 
the  maintenance  of  the  cathedral,  as  well  as  other 
episcopal  or  capitular  buildings.  At  the  period  I  am 
now  speaking  of  there  prevailed  a  not  groundless 
apprehension  that  these  immense  piles  would  fall 
into  decay,  past  repair.  So  far  as  regards  Salisbury, 
if  a  mistake  had  been  made  on  one  side,  a  far  more 
serious  mistake  had  been  made  on  the  othei".  If  one 
was  to  be  rectified,  why  not  the  other  also  ? 


COMPLETION  OF  CHOLDERTON  CHURCH.  179 


Any  great  work  is  sure  to  have  various  episodes, 
sharing  its  character  and  its  scale,  always  interesting 
to  those  who  believe  in  a  present  and  continual  Prov- 
idence, most  of  all  when  the  work  itself  has  a  relig- 
ious aim.  My  gardener,  the  one  whom  I  have  men- 
tioned above  as  driving  Newman  to  Salisbury  and 
keeping  his  tongue  going  all  the  way,  from  the  first 
commencement  of  the  new  church  to  its  completion 
—  eleven  years  —  thought,  worked,  and  talked  in- 
cessantly about  it,  and,  as  I  was  very  much  my  own 
builder  and  clerk  of  the  works,  was  of  the  greatest 
use  to  me,  managing  all  my  earthworks,  haulage, 
gathering  of  flints  from  the  hills  and  sand  from  the 
roadsides,  lodging  the  workpeople,  and  countless 
other  matters.  He  got  me  into  trouble  occasionally, 
for  he  could  not  see  a  big  stone  anj' where  without 
coveting  it,  and  the  surveyor  of  the  "  Duke  of 
Queensberry's  road  "  from  Andover  to  Amesbmy 
complained  much  of  our  pouncing  too  quickly  on  the 
accumulations  of  sand  on  tlie  roadside  after  a  storm. 
My  chief  farmer,  who  had  taken  my  original  appro- 
priation of  poor  Meacher  with  much  indifference, 
when  he  saw  him  in  this  new  character  would  say  I 
had  taken  from  him  his  best  man. 

We  never  had  a  serious  accident  daring  the  work, 
though  the  scaffolding  was  high  and  adventurous.  A 
young  man  fell  to  the  ground  from  the  height  of 
twenty-five  feet,  but  his  fall  was  fortunately  bnjken, 
and  in  half  an  hour  he  was  at  his  work  again.  For 
the  putting  together  of  the  open  roof  I  planned  a 
graduated  stage  moving  along  the  wall  plate. 

A  sad  accident  came  at  last.  My  own  intention 
had  been  to  retain  the  old  Norman  or  Saxon  font, 
as  a  relic  of  the  old  building,  which  was  originally 


180 


REMINISCENCES. 


Norman  or  Saxon.  But  Fraser,  now  Bishop  of  Man- 
chester, thought  its  rudeness  of  design  and  execution 
would  be  too  mucli  of  a  contrast  with  the  highly- 
finished  character  of  the  surroundings,  and  he  gave  a 
new  font  in  the  style  of  the  new  church.  It  was  an 
elaborate  affair,  and  was  long  in  the  sculptor's  yard, 
but  was  just  finished  the  day  before  the  consecration. 
Fraser  had  his  own  horse  put  into  the  cart,  and  the 
poor  beast,  not  understanding  the  occasion,  did  not 
like  it.  After  a  troublesome  journey  the  font  arrived 
at  the  church  gates,  which  the  horse  was  impatient 
to  enter.  Before  Meacher  could  govern  its  move- 
ments, or  get  out  of  the  way,  he  was  so  seriously  in- 
jured that,  instead  of  being  present  at  the  consecra- 
tion he  had  looked  forward  to  so  long,  he  had  to  lie 
in  bed  many  weeks. 

His  only  child  married  the  Ipswich  wood-carver's 
'prentice,  and  of  her  children  —  children  of  the  roof, 
as  they  might  be  called  —  one  is  certificated  mistress 
of  a  large  school  at  Islington,  and  the  other  certifi- 
cated master  of  an  important  school  in  Wales,  be- 
sides passing  successfully  through  several  of  the 
Oxford  local  examinations. 

Such  was  one  episode.  Here  is  another.  A  girl 
of  very  little  figure  applied  for  a  place,  and  had  no 
reference  to  give  except  to  her  clergyman,  a  good 
neighbor,  with  whom  I  had  had  many  battles  on  his 
Millennium  views.  On  my  writing  to  him  he  replied 
rather  favorably,  but  added  below  two  lines  from  a 
Greek  play,  to  the  effect  that  though  he  had  spoken 
of  this  giri  in  a  complimentary  way,  it  was  a  bad  lot 
that  she  came  from,  and  we  must  beware.  By  the 
time  she  had  been  in  our  service  a  year,  the  Ipswich 
wood-carvers  were  wanting  a  lad  to  assist  in  holding 


COMPLETION  OF  CHOLDERTON  CHURCH.  181 


the  pieces,  in  sharpening  the  tools,  and  looking  to 
the  glue-pot,  and  she  spoke  a  word  for  her  younger 
brother,  then  earning  low  wages  with  a  farmer.  He 
came,  and  I  thought  him  a  very  rough  fellow  indeed, 
but  he  looked  good,  and  had  intelligent  eyes. 

In  a  fortnight  the  wood -carvers  declared  them- 
selves quite  satisfied  with  him;  he  improved;  and 
when  they  left  they  took  him  to  Suffolk.  Thei'e  I 
heard  of  him  first  as  placed  over  the  other  workmen  ; 
then  as  conducting  church  restorations  for  his  mas- 
ter ;  finally  as  a  church  builder  and  restorer  on  his 
own  account.  Many  years  afterwards  I  noticed  from 
the  South- Western  Railway  that  a  large  church 
which  I  had  seen  built  was  being  enlarged  and  much 
improved.  I  went  purposely  from  town  to  see  it,  and 
found  that  the  whole  work  was  being  executed  by  the 
hero  of  this  little  tale. 


CHAPTER  XCIX. 


BAST  GRAFTON  CHUBCH. 

I  HAVE  said  that  I  had  to  leave  some  chapters  un- 
told ;  but  oue  I  must  tell.  It  brings  me  back  to  Sid- 
ney Herbert. 

In  July,  1842,  I  paid  a  visit  to  a  pupil's  brother, 
near  Great  Bedwyn,  bordering  on  Savernake  Forest, 
and  I  believe  mostly  the  property  of  the  Marquis  of 
Ailesbury.  We  went  to  see  a  church  then  building 
at  East  Grafton.  Ferrey  was  the  architect  employed 
by  Mr.  Ward,  Vicar  of  Great  Bedwyn,  and  one  of 
the  chief  promoters  of  Marlborough  College.  The 
design  is  an  instance  of  the  adventurous  and  experi- 
mental character  of  that  period,  when  it  was  reason 
enough  for  any  proposal  that  it  was  a  restoration,  or 
that  it  had  a  precedent. 

The  style  was  to  be  Norman ;  that  is,  in  the  de- 
tails. But  there  were  to  be  aisles,  and  over  them  a 
clerestory  four  feet  high,  lighted  with  very  small 
apertures.  But  now  came  the  novelty,  that  is  the  an- 
tiquitj'.  There  was  to  be  a  cylindrical  or  barrel- 
shaped  stone  roof,  interior  and  exterior  one  mass  of 
masonry.  The  spring  of  this  vault  would  of  course 
be  quite  above  the  summit  of  the  nave  arches. 

Now  a  cylindrical  or  semicircular  arch  is  one  pe- 
culiarly incapable  of  standing  by  itself.  The  upper 
part  is  nearly  as  flat  as  a  floor,  and  it  gravitates  di- 
rectly downwards,  easily  blowing  up  the  shoulders  or 


EAST  GRAFTON  CHURCH. 


183 


haunches  of  the  arch  ;  that  is  the  portion  of  it  mid- 
way between  the  spring  and  the  crown.  If  the 
haunches  can  be  kept  in  their  place,  then  the  vault 
is  safe  enough.  There  are  two  admissible  ways  of 
doing  this  ;  for  the  third  way,  iron  bars  tying  the 
two  haunches,  cannot  be  called  admissible.  The 
haunches  may  be  secured  in  their  place  by  a  properl}^ 
directed  lateral  pressure  in  the  form  of  buttresses,  or 
they  may  be  so  loaded  that  the  balance  of  gravita- 
tion will  be  in  favor  of  the  crown  remaining  where  it 
is,  and  not  coming  down. 

In  this  case,  by  the  design,  loading  was  the  secu- 
rity to  be  applied.  All  depended  then  on  the  weight 
and  compactness  of  the  mass  of  material  laid  on  the 
part  of  the  vault  midway  between  the  spring  and  the 
crown.  It  did  not  seem  to  me  adequate.  I  had  had 
many  expei'iences  of  arches,  whether  of  wood  or  of 
stone,  bulging  out  and  losing  form,  if  nothing  worse. 
A  wooden  structure  can  lose  form  with  comparative 
immunity  from  danger,  but  not  so  a  stone  vault. 

It  might  be  supposed  that  a  semicircular  arch 
would  be  easily  and  safely  constructed  in  iron,  which 
supplies  at  once  the  greatest  tenacity,  and  the  great- 
est I'esistance  to  pressure.  But,  as  a  matter  of  fact, 
the  chief  bridge  disasters  in  this  century  have  been 
with  iron  semicircular  arches,  such  as  that  at  New- 
castle, and  that  over  the  Tees  at  Stockton.  Tlie 
truth  is,  people  are  deceived  by  appearances.  A 
semicircular  arch  is  so  natural  and  beautiful,  that  it 
looks  as  if  it  ought  to  stand.  Unfortunately  its  du- 
ties are  not  aesthetic  or  moral,  but  simply  physical, 
and  in  obedience  to  the  laws  of  nature  it  persists  in 
falling  at  the  crown  and  rising  at  the  shoulders,  un- 
less the  latter  tendency  be  obviated.    In  the  case  of 


184 


REMINISCENCES. 


the  experiment  to  be  tried  at  East  Grafton,  if  the 
whole  was  one  hard  concreted  mass,,  then  the  danger 
might  be  veiy  little.  But  country  masonry  must  al- 
ways be  regarded  with  suspicion,  and  it  takes  long  to 
set  and  harden.  The  clerestory  walls,  I  must  add, 
were  to  be  very  solid ;  a  yard  thick,  and  rising  four 
feet  above  the  spring  of  the  vault. 

But  Mr.  "Ward,  who  was  a  great  archaeologist,  and 
had  a  fine  collection  of  models,  had  provided  two  ad- 
ditional guarantees,  as  he  deemed  them,  for  the  safety 
of  his  stone  vault.  The  first  was  an  exceedingly 
strong  stone  rib,  half  a  yard  deep,  springing  from  a 
corbel  over  every  pillar,  a  little  below  the  spring  of  the 
vaulting.  It  occurred  to  me  that  if  these  ribs  could 
be  made  diagonal,  instead  of  straight  across,  and  if 
the  vaulting  could  be  made  to  spring  from  them,  this 
would  mend  matters  :  but,  as  Mr.  Ward  explained 
afterwards,  this  could  not  be  done  without  raising  the 
vault  considerably.  I  did  not  much  like  the  look  of 
the  heavy  ribs,  projecting  a  foot  from  the  surface  of 
the  vault. 

The  second  additional  guarantee  was  more  extraor- 
dinary, indeed  inconceivable,  only  to  be  accounted 
for  by  one  of  those  prepossessions  sometimes  found  to 
occupy  the  mind,  and  disorder  reason  itself,  in  the 
comparative  seclusion  of  a  country  parsonage.  Mr. 
Ward  had  at  Great  Bedwyn  a  handsome  and  very  in- 
teresting church.  At  some  remote  period,  very  likely 
soon  after  the  building  of  the  church,  the  wooden  roof 
of  the  nave,  not  being  properly  tied  or  trussed,  had 
pushed  out  the  arcades  on  both  sides,  not  only  the 
clerestory,  but  the  arches  and  the  pillars  themselves. 
The  people  then  in  chai'ge  of  the  church  adopted  an 
expedient  which  might  be  the  best  under  the  circum- 


EAST  GRAFTON  CHURCH. 


185 


stances.  They  carried  solid  and  well-built  flying 
stone  buttresses  from  the  walls  of  the  aisles  to  the  ar- 
cades^  as  high  as  they  could,  so  as  not  to  interfere 
with  the  roof  of  the  aisles.  Every  architect  will 
smile  at  this  description,  and  say  to  himself  that  if  it 
answered  it  was  a  "•  fluke."  It  did  answer,  but  it  cer- 
tainly was  not  a  precedent  to  be  followed,  unless  on 
a  like  necessity. 

It  is  forty  years  since  I  saw  this  interior,  and  I 
write  from  memory.  I  have  lately  seen  a  very  good 
water-color  drawing  of  the  interior,  only  showing  the 
roof  of  one  aisle,  and  that  without  these  "  flying " 
buttresses.  Whether  it  is  an  oversight  of  the  artist, 
or  the  buttresses  are  confined  to  one  aisle,  I  cannot 
say. 

It  has  occurred  to  me  that  the  mediaeval  vicar,  or 
architect,  who  built  these  singular  flying  buttresses, 
had  a  very  striking  precedent  for  them,  likely  enough 
to  fascinate  an  amateur.  The  tower  and  spire  of 
Salisbury  Cathedral,  rising  to  400  feet,  all  rests  on 
four  pillars,  which  have  yielded  seriously  to  the  im- 
mense weight.  As  the  tower  and  spire  rose  in  suces- 
sive  generations  and  even  centuries,  these  settlements 
were  closely  watched,  and,  in  order  to  obviate  them 
as  much  as  possible,  the  architects  made  more  than  a 
hundred  flying  buttresses  running  through  the  per- 
pendicular and  horizontal  lines  of  the  clerestory 
under  the  roof  on  all  sides.  They  are  not  very  no- 
ticeable ;  but  there  they  are.  Any  Vicar  of  Great 
Bedwyn  who  was  a  frequenter  of  the  cathedral  could 
not  fail  to  be  familiar  with  them.  In  that  edifice 
they  are  indispensable,  which  is  all  that  can  be  said 
for  them. 

4-  similfir  prepossession  has  spoilt  our  St.  Paul's. 


186 


REMINISCENCES. 


Wren,  while  a  mathematical  prodigy  and  no  architect, 
had  an  early  acquaintance  with  Cathedral,  of 
which  his  uncle  was  bishop.  In  that  case  the  failure 
of  the  central  tower  and  four  supporting  pillars  had 
suggested,  if  not  necessitated,  the  wooden  octagon 
which  to  all  Cambridge  men  is  to  this  day  the  object 
of  an  almost  idolatrous  admiration.  This  expedient, 
for  such  it  Avas,  disguised  as  it  may  be,  Wren  imjjorted 
into  his  design  for  St.  Paul's,  abandoning  the  tradi- 
tional four  piers  of  the  Italian  dome.  He  thereby 
got  a  larger  area  for  his  dome  as  well  as  aisles  seen 
from  end  to  end,  but  it  was  at  the  serious  cost  of  nar- 
rowing his  nave,  choir,  and  transepts. 

To  Mr.  Ward  the  interior  flying  buttresses  were 
the  most  interesting  and  picturesque  features  in  his 
parish  church,  and  he  availed  himself  of  this  opportu- 
nity to  reproduce  them.  Following  the  precedent 
of  his  own  church,  they  arrived  at  the  nave  walls 
below  the  aisle  roof,  and  consequently  quite  below 
the  spring  of  the  vault.  The  abutment  afforded  by 
them  fell  several  feet  below  the  haunch  of  the  vault- 
ing, where  it  was  really  wanted.  I  insisted  on  these 
points,  and  some  others  which  were  more  matters  of 
style,  to  Mr.  Ward's  friend,  expressing  strong  mis- 
givings as  to  the  safety  of  the  structure. 

Mr.  Ward  wrote  to  me  early  in  August,  proposing 
an  appointment  to  come  and  see  the  church  with  him 
and  Mr.  Parker  of  Oxford.  The  meeting,  however, 
could  not  be  managed  till  the  end  of  that  month. 
At  that  date  the  whole  of  the  vaulting  lay  on  the 
ground,  beautifully  shaped,  ready  to  be  put  up.  I 
persisted  in  my  objections,  but  Mr.  Ward  was  not  to 
be  shaken. 

It  now  appeared  that  he  had  already  had  a  battle 


EAST  GRAFTON  CHURCH. 


187 


for  his  stone  roof.  It  was  contrary  to  the  express 
requirements  of  the  Incorporated  Society,  but  had 
yet  been  passed  by  their  Board.  Their  surveyor, 
however,  would  not  sanction  a  vault  under  any  mod- 
ification. Ferrey,  nothing  daunted,  submitted  his 
plan  to  Professor  Willis,  who  at  once  pronounced  it 
good  and  safe,  and  wrote  a  memorial  to  the  Board  to 
that  effect,  after  which  the  surveyor's  opinion  was 
set  aside.  The  Board  also  then  and  there  appointed 
a  sub-comraittee  of  "  scientific  gentlemen,"  before 
whom  all  plans  were  thenceforth  to  be  presented 
before  they  could  reach  the  Boai-d,  thus  in  a  great 
measure  superseding  the  surveyors. 

Mr.  Ward,  however,  now  wrote  to  Ferrey,  with 
my  objections,  and  Ferrey,  whose  hands  no  doubt 
were  full,  referred  me  to  Robert  Williams,  one  of  my 
Oriel  contemporaries  and  friends.  The  vault  had 
been  suggested,  it  now  appeared,  by  that  of  St. 
Catherine's  chapel,  Abbotsbury,  a  desecrated  ruin  on 
the  coast,  not  far  from  Dorchester.  The  roof  there 
is  one  mass  of  masonry,  the  same  stones  showing  in- 
side and  outside ;  and,  up  to  tliis  date,  it  had  stood 
all  the  storms  of  the  Atlantic.  It  had  no  abutment, 
only  rising  from  a  good  thick  wall,  and  had  no 
loading. 

But  the  resemblance  between  this  roof  and  Mr. 
Ward's  was  nominal  and  illusory.  The  drawing 
which  Robert  Williams  sent  me  showed  that  the 
vault  there  had  completed  a  large  part  of  its  cur- 
vature, indeed  all  the  dangerous  part,  before  it  had 
left  the  solid  walls,  and  that  the  vault  being  equi- 
lateral, the  pitch  was  so  high  that  no  further  abut- 
ment was  required,  and  that  in  fact  the  vault  ap- 
proached very  near  to  that  catenary  curve  which  is, 


188 


EEMI^'ISCE^XES. 


theoretically,  the  perfection  of  safety  in  vaulting. 
Robert  Williams  recognized  the  differences  between 
the  two  vaults,  but  did  not  think  them  material.  His 
letter  to  this  effect  was  on  October  13. 

On  one  of  the  fix'st  days  of  December  I  saw  a 
hearse  pass  my  parsonage  towards  Salisbury.  There 
were  few  people  to  die  between  me  and  Marlborough, 
and  I  had  not  heard  of  any  one  likely  to  die.  I 
immediately  thought  of  East  Grafton  Church.  As 
they  would  be  sure  to  stop  in  the  village,  I  sent  my 
servant  to  make  inquiries.  The  hearse  had  stopped 
a  minute  and  gone  on.  It  was  a  clergyman  who  had 
been  killed  by  the  fall  of  a  church.  I  could  not  say 
how  soon  and  how  quickly  every  part  of  the  catas- 
trophe presented  itself  to  my  mind,  even  to  the 
victim. 

Sidney  Herbert  had  wished  to  see  the  new  church, 
in  which  the  Marquis  of  Ailesbury  and  his  people 
were  much  interested.  So  he  had  appointed  a  day. 
It  was  earlier  than  was  wished,  and  the  weather  did 
not  mend  matters.  Ferrey  was  written  to.  He 
urged  expedition  in  loading  the  haunches  of  the 
vault,  and  gave  his  permission  for  the  centre,  that  is 
the  wooden  frame  upon  which  the  vault  had  been 
built,  to  be  lowered  a  few  inches.  There  came, 
however,  more  rainy  days,  and  the  loading  could  have 
been  little  better  than  mud. 

Sidney  Herbert  came,  bringing  with  him  Mr. 
Montgomery,  a  sort  of  cousin,  whom  I  had  frequently 
heard  of  as  an  amiable  and  excellent  man,  of  great 
taste,  and  fond  of  church  architecture.  They  took 
their  position  within  the  church.  The  "  centre  "  had 
been  lowei-ed  some  inches,  and  the  vault  stood.  It 
was  no  longer  deriving  any  support  from  its  cradle, 


EAST  GRAFTON  CHURCH. 


189 


as  the  centre  might  be  called.  So  orders  were  given 
to  lower  it ;  it  was  lowered,  some  said  two  feet,  some 
said  four.  All  at  once  it  came  down,  and  a  large 
stone  of  one  of  the  massive  ribs,  rebounding  from  a 
scaffold  pole,  struck  Mr.  Montgomery  dead  on  the 
spot.  I  saw  the  other  day  in  the  papers  the  death 
of  Mrs.  Montgomery,  after  a  widowhood  of  thirty- 
eight  years. 

Upon  hearing  the  sad  news  Ferrey  went  of?  to  T. 
H.  Wyatt,  and  got  him  to  write  to  me.  He  could 
only  say  what  I  knew  already,  and  what  was  quite 
suflBcient  to  prove  the  downfall  of  the  vault  no  con- 
clusive proof  of  its  vicious  construction.  The  new- 
ness of  the  work,  its  wetness,  and  the  want  of  load- 
ing wei-e  enough  to  account  for  the  result.  Nor  had 
Ferrey's  order  been  properly  obeyed.  Nevertheless, 
poor  Ward  felt  he  must  abandon  his  stone  vault. 
Indeed  he  would.never  have  got  a  congregation  to 
sit  under  it.  He  had  to  substitute  a  wooden  im- 
itative vault,  no  doubt  better  for  comfort  and  for 
hearing. 

After  the  event  I  sent  the  drawings  Ward  had 
kindly  given  me  to  W.  Froude  for  his  scientific 
judgment  on  them.  He  said  the  calculation  was 
curiously  exact,  but  there  was  no  spare  strength.  If 
the  masonry  was  good  the  vault  would  stand ;  not 
otherwise. 


CHAPTER  C. 


MANUEL  JOHNSON. 

On  returning  to  residence  in  1835,  I  found  a 
visitor  from  another  world,  as  he  seemed  to  me,  and 
strangely  out  of  place  at  Oxford.  Manuel  J.  John- 
son was  the  son  of  an  Indian  officer,  and  was,  I  think, 
a  ward  of  Bowden,  Newman's  chief  college  friend. 
He  had  entered  the  University,  and  was  in  lodgings 
in  Broad  Street,  opposite  Baliol.  My  first  impres- 
sion was  that  he  was  simply  making  use  of  the  Uni- 
versity in  order  to  pass  through  it  as  easily  and 
quickly  as  possible  to  some  profession  —  the  Church, 
possibly.  But  it  was  soon  evident  he  was  no  bird  of 
passage.  To  face  a  public  classical  examination  at 
the  age  of  thirty-five,  after  some  length  of  military 
services  in  various  parts  of  the  world,  implied  cour- 
age, and  it  was  rewarded  with  success. 

Excepting  in  his  actual  years,  and  in  his  varied 
experiences,  Johnson  was  still  youthful,  not  to  say 
boyish.  But  he  had  already  done  and  seen  much. 
Stationed  at  the  Cape  of  Good  Hope  and  at  St. 
Helena,  he  had  employed  his  leisure  in  making,  from 
actual  observation,  a  new  and  much-wanted  map  of 
the  stars  of  the  Southern  Hemisphere.  It  appeared 
in  the  form  of  a  Catalogue  of  606  Southern  Stars, 
published  by  the  East  India  Company.  Herschel 
waived  his  own  claim  to  the  gold  medal  of  the  As- 
tronomical Society  in  favor  of  this  young  and  private 
adventurer  in  that  very  arduous  field. 


MANUEL  JOHNSON. 


191 


For  a  considerable  time  Johnson  had  had  the  duty 
of  guarding  Napoleon's  tomb,  and  of  receiving  the 
officers  and  crew  of  every  French  ship  stopping  at 
St.  Helena,  and  invariably  marching  up  in  solemn 
procession.  The  officers  wished  to  make  some  recog- 
nition of  his  kindness,  and  they  generally  hit  on  a 
box  of  the  best  qigars.  Johnson  was  no  smoker  up 
to  that  date  ;  but  by  the  time  these  boxes  had  accu- 
mulated, it  occurred  to  him  to  smoke  them  through, 
which,  with  his  wonted  perseverance,  he  effected. 

Very  soon  after  he  had  taken  his  degi-ee,  the  place 
of  Observer  at  the  Radcliffe  Observatory  fell  vacant 
by  the  death  of  tlie  tender  and  gentle  Rigaud ;  and, 
through  Sir  R.  Peel  chiefly,  I  believe,  Johnson  was 
appointed  to  fill  it.  For  twenty  years  he  pursued 
with  unremitting  industry  and  care  a  work  which 
has  in  its  nature  very  little  of  the  reward  of  this 
world,  scarcely  an  appreciable  field,  and  no  present 
results  whatever.  He  had  not  to  look  out  for  beau- 
tiful or  startling  objects.  The  moon  and  the  planets 
exhibit  varieties  of  surface  which  justly  excite  our 
curiosity  as  neighbors,  not  without  a  direct  interest 
in  the  fortunes  of  our  whole  system.  We  are  indeed 
actually  sensible  of  their  perturbing  forces.  Comets 
come  and  go,  making  a  temporary  sensation,  and 
leaving  strange  problems.  Celestial  geography,  so 
to  speak,  is  quite  as  full  of  marvels  as  terrestrial. 
An  amateur  may  spend  a  fortune  and  a  life,  and  still 
waste  himself  upon  ever-multiplying  stars  and  nebulas 
disclosing  the  strangest  and  most  fanciful  caprices  of 
form.  A  great  observer  has  to  avert  his  gaze  from 
these  fascinating  objects,  and  to  leave  even  the 
numerous  and  still-increasing  family  of  planetoids  to 
his  subordinates,  naturally  eager  for  such  small  prey. 


192 


REMINISCKNCES. 


Whenever  the  state  of  the  atmosphere  allowed, 
Johnson  had  to  observe  all  the  stars  large  enough 
and  convenient  enough  for  observation,  as  they  passed 
the  meridian.  I  remember  his  telling  me  that  every 
observation  required  two  hundred  reductions  and  cor- 
rections, many  of  them,  of  course,  constant,  or  in 
groups.  He  w"as  dealing  with  exact  facts,  but  with 
inexact  instruments,  and  in  a  deceptive  medium.  He 
"was  a  terrestrial  conversing  with  celestials.  Happily 
for  poor  human  nature,  there  are  not  many  nights  in 
the  British  year  in  which  observation  is  possible, 
AVhen  the  clouds  draw  their  curtains  round  him  the 
astronomer  may  go  to  bed,  to  be  waked  up  possibly. 
Practically  this  work  is  carried  on  in  the  open  air, 
and  without  artificial  warmth.  Even  Johnson's  singu- 
larly robust  frame  could  not  have  stood  it,  but  for 
the  kind  Providence  that  heaped  up  cigars  about  him 
till  he  was  compelled  to  smoke  them,  for  it  was  this 
tliat  enabled  him  to  endure  his  long  night-watchings. 
His  loving  wife  sat  up  with  him  many  nights  entei- 
ing  figures  at  his  dictation,  no  doubt  to  the  perma- 
nent injury  of  her  health  and  strength. 

Some  of  these  fixed  stars  —  few  they  may  be  called 
in  comparison  with  what,  to  us,  is  an  infinite  num- 
ber —  have  either  "  proper  "  motions,  or  appearances 
of  motion,  that  instruments  can  reach.  If  the  exact 
position  of  some  six  thousand  is  recorded  and  pub- 
lished every  year,  it  is  with  the  hope  that  changes 
of  position  will  be  ascertained.  The  first  object  is  to 
obtain  the  parallax  of  these  remote  bodies.  Even  in 
these  davs,  when  Ladies'  Colleges  give  the  best  of 
their  hours  to  mathematics,  it  is  not  every  lady  who 
knows  what  this  parallax  is.  She  will  understand, 
however,  that  when  she  changes  her  place  in  a  room 


MANUEL  JOHNSON. 


193 


by  a  couple  of  yards,  she  thereby  changes  her  bear- 
ings to  the  rest  of  the  company,  so  that  those  people 
who  were  in  front  of  her,  or  behind  her,  may  be 
now  by  her  side.  She  might  reasonably  expect, 
therefore,  that  if  she  changed  her  place  near  two 
hundred  millions  of  miles,  which  in  fact  she  does 
every  six  months,  she  would  thereby  change  her 
bearings  to  all  objects  within  sight,  and  see  their 
apparent  places  changed  also.  In  fact,  however, 
there  is  no  such  manifest  change  in  the  place  of  the 
fixed  stars,  and  it  requires  the  best  instruments,  the 
closest  observation,  and  much  calculation,  to  make 
out  that  there  is  any  change  at  all.  The  change, 
when  ascertained,  is  the  measure  of  our  distance 
from  the  star. 

The  total  number  of  fixed  stars  of  which  the 
pai'allax,  and  consequently  the  distance,  has  been 
ascertained,  I  find  stated  in  one  recent  publication  to 
be  twelve,  in  another  only  nine.  We  have,  then, 
very  few  neighbors,  and  even  they  cannot  be  called 
near.  Of  the  twelve  the  nearest  is  almost  twenty 
billions  of  miles  from  us,  the  farthest  twenty  times 
as  far.  It  is  impossible,  humanly  speaking,  to 
ascertain  the  distances  of  more,  and,  so  far  as  regards 
this  expectation,  astronomers  are  only  hoping  against 
hope,  without  the  most  remote  chance  of  satisfaction. 

These  nearest  stars  in  the  whole  universe  have 
been  brought  within  measurement  by  observations  it 
is  almost  painful  to  tliink  of.  On  the  surface  of  the 
earth  it  is  possible  to  see  an  object  —  say  the  chief 
mountain  of  Corsica  —  from  the  Maritime  Alps,  at 
the  distance  of  160  miles.  What  a  problem  it  seems 
to  measure  the  length  of  a  man  at  that  distance  to  an 
inch  !  but  that  is  the  problem  believed  to  have  been 

VOL.  II.  13 


194 


REMINISCENCES. 


successfully  accomplished  in  the  case  of  these  very 
few  fixed  stars.  So  it  must  be  deemed  certain  that 
farther  we  cannot  go.  The  greatest  parallax  yet 
ascei'tained,  that  is  of  the  nearest  fixed  star,  does  not 
come  to  a  "second"  of  the  great  circle,  and  the  in- 
evitable errors  attendant  on  any  observation  gener- 
ally amount  to  as  much. 

The  natural  organs  of  sight  make  this  double 
observation  continually,  and  for  the  same  purpose,  to 
estimate  the  distance  of  an  object.  The  two  eyes 
are  two  observers,  that  at  the  interval  of  three  inches 
notice  an  object,  in  this  case  simultaneously,  and 
compare  the  angles  made  by  the  lines  of  vision. 
What  they  ascertain  is  the  parallax  of  the  object. 
They  who  have  the  misfortune  to  lose  an  eye  im- 
mediately find  that  this  measure  of  distance,  and 
of  size  too,  is  much  impaired.  But  the  degeneration 
of  the  surviving  eye,  by  the  creation  of  different 
foci,  sometimes  comes  to  the  aid  of  vision  by  afford- 
ing an  irregular  basis  for  the  indispensable  calculation. 
When  people  begin  to  see  half  a  dozen  moons  they 
may  be  thankful  to  know  that  this  confusion  is  itself 
a  measure  of  distance. 

But  there  is  even  a  grander  and  more  awful  question 
than  our  distance  from  some  dozen  or  two  stars.  It  is 
the  constitution,  the  movement,  and  the  destiny  of 
the  universe.  Whither  are  all  these  stars  moving? 
What  are  they  tending  to?  What  is  their  centre,  if 
there  be  any,  which  is  very  presumable  ?  As  many 
as  270  stars  have  been  ascertained  to  have  "  proper  " 
motions,  that  is  actual  motions  through  space  ;  but 
the  probability  is  that  all  the  stars  are  changing  their 
places,  though  it  will  take,  may  be,  a  thousand  years 
of  observation  to  ascertain  the  speed,  or  the  direction, 
or  the  curves  of  their  motion. 


MANUEL  JOHNSON. 


195 


It  is  a  question,  indeed  a  very  new  one,  whether 
the  sun  moves  in  space  at  all ;  but  there  is  also  a 
fair  probability  that  it  moves  a  hundred  and  fifty 
millions  of  miles  in  a  year,  which  is  but  a  quarter 
of  the  earth's  speed  in  its  orbit.  That  this  direct 
movement  carried  on  for  thousands  of  years  should 
make  no  palpable  difference  in  the  apparent  place  of 
tlie  stars  is  inconceivable.  So  also  that  the  stars  we 
call  "  fixed "  should  be  continually  moving  right 
across  the  field  of  view  with  inconceivable  rapidity, 
and  without  changing  their  apparent  position  to  us, 
or  to  one  another,  may  seem  incredible.  But  it  is  a 
matter  of  easy  calculation.  If  a  star  be  at  the  distance 
of  the  number  of  miles  represented  by  sixteen 
numerals,  then  it  may  have  been  rushing  through 
the  universe  ever  since  the  Creation  at  the  rate  of 
our  own  earth  in  its  revolution  round  the  sun,  that  is 
over  two  millions  of  miles  in  twenty-four  hours, 
without  greater  total  change  in  its  apparent  position 
than  would  follow  from  a  walk  of  twenty  yards  across 
the  surface  of  the  moon.  As  our  instruments  have 
hitherto  failed  to  ascertain  the  moon's  diameter  to  a 
mile,  a  very  conceivable  and  intelligible  statement, 
no  one  need  be  staggered  at  the  thought  of  the 
"fixed"  stars  shooting  across  space  at  the  speed  of 
our  own  planet  for  thousands  of  years  without  any 
apparent  change  of  position. 

These  observations  are  duly  calculated,  recorded, 
and  printed,  and  interchanged  between  the  world's 
observatories,  for  comparison  and  correction  if  need 
be.  The  great  secrets  contained  in  them  are  to  be 
unravelled  a  thousand  years  hence.  Even  a  million 
years  would  hardly  suffice  "  to  loose  the  bands  of 
Orion."    It  is  a  bare  hope  that  there  will  still  be 


196 


BEMmiSCENCES. 


astronomers  ten  centuries  hence,  that  science  will 
still  be  in  honor,  and  that  no  wave  of  human  progress 
will  have  swept  away  all  the  knowledge  that  does 
not  directly  minister  to  our  first  or  coarsest  wants. 

I  am  painfully  aware  of  being  out  of  my  province, 
perhaps  out  of  my  depth,  in  this  attempt  to  describe 
Johnson's  astronomical  labors.  He  is  chiefly  re- 
membered at  Oxford  as  a  very  good  fellow,  a  man  of 
fine  taste  and  varied  attainments,  as  a  warm-hearted 
friend  and  a  true  Christian.  The  special  work  of  his 
life  should  not  be  left  untold.  Moreover,  I  will  confess 
to  be  often  painfully  struck  by  the  ignorance,  and 
apparent  indifference,  of  young  ladies  and  gentlemen 
even  upon  such  matters  as  the  constitution  and  order 
of  the  universe.  On  this  and  other  matters  there 
will  be  books  on  the  shelves,  and  very  good  books 
too,  while  there  is  not  a  fact,  or  an  idea,  or  the  least 
wish  to  leai'n,  in  the  young  people  sitting  below.  I  will 
run  the  risk  of  blunders,  and  perhaps  ridicule,  rather 
than  omit  the  opportunity  of  calling  the  blind  and 
the  stupid  to  grand  and  ennobling  considerations, 
happily  requiring  nothing  but  the  conception  of 
numbers  and  space,  and  a  very  little  arithmetic. 

But  besides  watching  the  stars,  which  some  think 
may  be  left  to  take  care  of  themselves,  as  not  appre- 
ciable concerning  us,  Johnson  undertook  terrestrial 
observations  not  less  delicate  and  curious  and  inter- 
esting. He  had  automatic  instruments  for  noting 
and  registering  the  direction  and  force  of  the  winds, 
the  rainfall,  the  temperature,  and  the  variations  of  the 
needle.  Most  mysterious  indeed  are  these  latter  vari- 
ations, —  even  that  regular  oscillation  east  and  west  of 
the  north  pole,  and  the  regular  diurnal  variations, — 
but  it  was  something  more  than  mysterious,  it  was 


MANUEL  JOHNSON. 


197 


awful,  to  find  that  in  the  middle  of  one  night,  without 
any  cause  that  could  be  suggested,  all  the  Observa- 
tories in  the  world  recorded  the  fact  of  a  strong 
galvanic  thrill  passing  through  the  solid  mass  of  this 
huge  globe.  After  twenty  years  of  this  work  Johnson 
began  to  feel  the  need  of  rest ;  but  the  heavens  are 
never  weary.  They  never  cease  to  sing  His  praise, 
and  the  observer  died  at  his  post.  Twenty  octavo 
volumes  record  his  observations ;  but  they  were 
summed  up  after  his  death  in  a  Catalogue  of  6,317 
Circumpolar  and  other  Stars  observed  at  Oxford, 
and  reduced  to  one  date. 

Such  a  career  was  in  itself  remarkable,  but  it  was 
still  more  so  in  the  character  of  the  man,  and  in  the 
qualities  he  combined  with  a  pursuit  so  absorbing 
and  so  insulating.  If  Johnson  had  been  nothing, 
and  had  known  nothing,  more  than  the  least  am- 
bitious of  the  academic  crowd,  his  originality,  his 
geniality,  his  humor,  would  have  distinguished  him 
in  the  University.  His  ever  beaming,  almost  jovial 
countenance,  his  laughing  eye,  his  ready  wit,  seemed 
hardly  those  of  a  man  whose  nights  were  spent  in 
piercing  through  the  mystery  of  the  univei'se,  and 
calculating  the  mazes  of  a  dance,  each  step  of  Avhich 
is  a  thousand  years.  None  can  forget  the  mirth  with 
which  he  could  relieve  the  dullest  hour,  or  the  kind- 
ness with  which  he  would  explain  the  operation  of 
the  mighty  machines  about  him,  and  the  manifold 
contrivances  necessary  to  meet  a  thousand  difficulties. 

He  had  his  troubles  and  grievances.  The  trustees 
had  a  good  deal  to  do  with  their  money,  and  John- 
son's demands  no  doubt  were  large  and  exigent.  He 
naturally  assumed  his  to  be,  next  to  the  Royal  Obser- 
vatory, the  first  in  the  world.    An  important  instru- 


198 


KEMIXISCENCES. 


ment,  to  cost  a  thousand  pounds  or  two,  was  refused 
or  postponed  because  some  farm  buildings  on  tlie  trust 
property  had  to  be  rebuilt  on  a  grand  scale.  An 
instrument  made  at  Hamburgh,  I  think,  by  the  best 
maker  in  Europe,  and  carefully  packed  and  screwed 
down  for  the  passage  in  thirty  cases,  arrived  at  the 
English  port.  Johnson  hastened  to  speed  it  through 
the  Customs.  In  spite  of  his  assui'ances  and  entreaties 
every  case  was  torn  open,  and  the  delicate  contents 
pulled  about  by  rough  hands  to  ascertain  whether 
any  tobacco  or  kid  gloves  were  concealed  under  them. 

A  less  serious  but  still  unpleasant  mishap  seemed 
to  mark  a  destiny  among  bodies  moving  in  space.  In 
his  best  holiday  suit  Johnson  was  slowly  ascending 
the  hill  in  Greenwich  Park  to  attend  the  annual  vis- 
itation of  the  Royal  Observatory,  when  a  random 
stone  flung  by  a  boy  at  play  knocked  in  one  of  his 
front  teeth  —  a  slight  thing,  but  an  epoch  in  any  life. 

The  trustees  had  so  little  appreciation  of  Johnson's 
services,  that  at  one  time,  with  a  large  family  grow- 
ing up  around  him,  he  seriously  contemplated  taking 
to  stock  broking.  It  would  be  easier  and  more  profit- 
able, besides  being  much  shorter  work,  to  forecast 
the  sublunary  vicissitudes  of  currency  and  credit  than 
those  of  the  universe.  For  this  he  had  the  encourage- 
ment of  Baily,  who  was  making  his  fortune  on  the 
Stock  Exchange,  and  at  the  same  time  weighing  the 
earth  in  a  small  back  parlor  near  Tavistock  Square. 

Considering  the  one  idea  that  could  not  but  pre- 
dominate and  dwarf  all  lesser  things,  the  material 
universe  to  be  measured  and  surveyed,  it  was  marvel- 
lous how  Johnson  could  feel  a  warm  and  "exciting 
interest  in  all  human  affairs,  including  the  politics  of 
the  country  and  of  the  University,  the  progress  of  the 


MANUEL  JOHNSON. 


199 


Oxford  movement,  and  the  discoveries  of  science. 
Everybody  who  attended  his  weekly  receptions,  be- 
sides hearing  many  a  hearty  laugh,  would  be  sure  to 
carry  away  some  definite  addition  to  his  stock  of 
knowledge,  so  freshly  and  incisively  did  Johnson  tell 
what  he  had  to  say.  Besides  this,  the  visitor  saw  on 
the  walls,  on  the  table,  and  in  portfolios,  the  best, 
if  not  then  the  only,  collection  of  early  drawings  and 
first-class  engravings  at  Oxford,  and  one  of  the  best 
in  England.  Strange  as  it  might  seem,  Johnson  knew 
all  the  stages  of  a  Marc  Antonio  or  any  other  earl}'^ 
Italian  masterpiece  as  well  as  if  that  had  been  his 
profession,  and  not  the  formless,  unchanging  stars. 
I  know  not  whether  extreme  delicacy  of  apprehen- 
sion and  refinement  of  taste  be  often  combined  with 
patience  of  observation  and  mathematical  accuracy, 
but  certainly  Manuel  Johnson's  example  encourages 
the  belief  that  the  most  abstract  science  is  compatible 
with  a  fine  taste,  a  capacious  mind,  and  a  heart  full 
of  kindly  affections.  He  and  my  brother  James,  the 
Canon  and  Professor,  married  twin  daughters  of  Dr. 
Ogle,  Regius  Professor  of  Medicine,  a  pleasant  little 
companionship  now  no  more. 


CHAPTER  CI. 


JAMES  SHERGOLD  BOONE. 

The  exact  time  when  Newman  undertook  to  sup- 
ply four  sheets  to  the  "  British  Critic,"  as  well  as  the 
exact  duration  of  that  impossible  arrangement,  has 
escaped  my  recollection.  I  had  even  been  under 
the  impression  for  many  years  that  Le  Bas  was  the 
editor  with  whom  this  arrangement  was  made.  I 
am  reminded,  however,  that  it  was  Boone.  Le  Bas 
wrote  so  much  and  so  brilliantly  that  he  had  almost 
eclipsed  Boone  from  my  memory,  aware  as  I  am  that 
the  latter  had  had  to  do  with  the  "  British  Critic." 

Should  anybody  care  to  take  up  that  interesting 
and  instructive  question.  How  do  so  many  men  of 
great  promise  make  egregious  failures  ?  he  may  ad- 
vantageously study  the  career  of  James  Shergold 
Boone,  one  of  Dr.  Russell's  many  and  great  disap- 
pointments. He  was  at  Charterhouse  from  1812  to 
1816,  and  got  the  gold  medal  for  Latin  verse.  He 
then  became  a  student  at  Christchurch,  in  those  days 
a  piece  of  high  favor,  and  about  the  best  position  an 
undergraduate  could  have  in  the  University.  He 
was  very  early  known  as  the  most  promising  man  at 
Oxford.  When  I  went  to  Charterhouse,  in  1820, 
there  were  many  who  remembered  Boone  as  the 
giant  of  a  former  age,  the  like  of  whom  would  never 
be  seen  again.  He  could  do  everything  and  carry 
evei-ything  before  him.  There  was  a  halo  of  glory 
about  his  name. 


JAMES  SHERGOLD  BOONE. 


201 


But  either  already,  or  soon  after,  there  was  a 
cloud,  a  temporary  cloud  only,  on  that  name.  We 
were  told  that  Boone,  for  some  reason  or  other,  had 
quarrelled  with  the  college  authorities,  and  that  with 
the  amiable  and  sensible  design  of  spiting  them  he 
had  resolved  not  to  go  in  for  honors.  He  had  got 
the  "  Newdigate  "  on  the  Farnese  Hercules  in  1817, 
and  in  the  same  year  the  prize  for  Latin  verse  on 
the  Foundation  of  the  Persian  Empire ;  and  in  1820 
he  had  the  prize  for  a  Latin  essay  on  the  Constitu- 
tion and  Working  of  the  Amphictyonic  Council.  So 
the  absence  of  his  name  from  the  Honor  List  is  not 
very  intelligible.  He  had  been  employing  his  time 
better,  as  he  thought,  in  writing  and  publishing  a 
now  forgotten  series  of  lampoons  in  verse,  called  the 
"  Oxford  Spy."  I  saw  it  once,  and  once  only.  It 
was  clever,  dull,  and  hateful  ;  a  thing  to  read  for 
two  minutes  and  throw  into  the  fire. 

What  induced  Boone  to  tie  himself  to  that  stake 
and  nail  himself  to  that  pillory  I  can  hardly  imagine. 
Putting  aside  his  temper,  which  must  have  been  de- 
testable, he  might  possibly  be  indulging  in  a  recoil 
from  the  extreme  drudgery  of  the  Charterhouse 
routine,  of  which  he  was  the  principal  victim  for 
four  or  five  years.  The  truth  is  that,  devoting  him- 
self entirely  to  critical  scholarship,  Russell  did  not 
inspire  one  single  scholar  with  an  enthusiasm,  or 
even  a  taste,  in  that  direction.  Some  were  in  open 
revolt  against  the  system  for  years,  and  Russell  had 
to  tolerate  it. 

Not  only  they  but  many  others  rendering  an  os- 
tensible obedience  were  indulging  in  their  own  fan- 
cies and  their  own  lines  of  speculation  all  the  time. 
Knowing  it  to  be  wrong,  they  did  not  entirely  lose 


202 


EEMINISCENCES. 


their  conscience  or  their  temper  with  a  master  whom 
they  felt  it  impossible  not  to  respect  and  reverence. 
In  some,  as  in  Boone,  the  rebellion  was  smothered 
for  a  time,  to  burst  out  afterwai'ds.  In  my  own  case 
the  worst  had  arrived  long  before  I  left  school,  and 
Russell  could  hope  no  more.  "  Mozley,"  he  said, 
at  parting,  with  tears  in  his  eyes,  "you're  born  to 
create  hope  and  to  disappoint  it."  Russell  told  my 
father,  when  he  called  on  him,  that  I  was  "dreamy," 
and  he  would  sometimes  exclaim,  "  What  green  fields 
are  you  rambling  over  ?  "  He  hit  the  mark  nearer 
when  he  said  once  or  twice  that  they  who  were  not 
doing  what  they  ought  to  be  doing  were  generally 
doing  what  they  ought  not.  As  a  fact,  however, 
every  line  that  I  realized  in  the  school  work,  every 
word  of  import,  or  of  beaut}',  or  of  quaintness,  had 
to  me  a  centrifugal  force,  and  sent  me  off  upon  a 
fresh  aberration. 

Boone  I  only  saw  once.  He  preached  at  St.  Mary's 
in  his  turn,  and  there  was  a  large  congi'egation  to 
hear  one  who  had  left  a  name  and  a  story  at  Oxford. 
A  man  of  high  moral  quality  or  of  real  genius  would 
have  flung  aside  his  antecedents  altogether,  and  car- 
ried his  hearers  with  him  into  very  different  ground. 
Boone  had  bound  his  future  to  his  past,  and  he 
preached  a  penitential  sermon.  Had  he  appeared 
in  sackcloth  and  ashes  he  could  not  have  made  a 
more  doleful  or  a  more  despicable  figure.  He  al- 
luded to  his  past  career  in  terras  which  led  me  to 
suppose  at  the  time  that  he  had  been  really  worse 
than  he  was  in  fact,  and  he  hoped  it  might  be  for- 
given. His  voice  faltered  once  or  twice,  and  tears 
came  into  his  eyes. 

After  all,  it  was  a  dull  and  not  very  intelligible 


JAMES  SHEEGOLD  BOONE. 


203 


sermon,  and  the  public  act  of  penance  stood  out  as 
its  chief  feature.  Before  whom  was  it  performed? 
Very  few  of  the  undei'graduates  by  that  time  had 
ever  heard  of  the  "  Oxford  Spy,"  or  would  care  to 
know  about  it.  The  Heads  of  Houses  might  remem- 
ber it.  But  as  well  shed  tears  before  Rhadamanthus 
as  before  that  inexorable  board.  So  nothing  came 
of  this  singular  exhibition. 

At  this  time  Boone  had  already  gone  through  a 
rather  remarkable  career  in  the  London  world.  He 
had  been  a  ready  speaker  as  well  as  writer.  Very 
soon  after  his  leaving  Oxford,  the  Duke  of  New- 
castle, or  some  other  great  boroughmonger,  had 
offered  him  a  seat  in  Parliament,  and  £500  a  year, 
it  was  said,  for  his  personal  needs.  Boone  found 
he  would  have  to  support,  not  his  own  opinions,  but 
his  patron's,  and  he  declined. 

The  next  thing  one  heard  was  that  he  was  de- 
livering lectures  in  the  city  of  London  upon  the 
union  and  mutual  relation  of  the  arts  and  sciences, 
to  small  but  discerning  audiences.  The  hearers, 
however,  went  away  saying  it  was  very  clever  and 
very  true,  and  did  not  come  again.  Boone  then 
started  a  Review,  and  called  it  the  "  Council  of  Ten," 
again  as  unfortunate  in  his  title  as  when  he  described 
himself  as  the  "  Oxford  Spy."  The  historic  Council 
of  Ten,  whatever  its  necessity  or  its  functions  at 
Venice,  is  not  an  agreeable  idea  to  Englishmen.  The 
title  was  a  satire  on  the  press,  not  a  just  description 
of  any  respectable  organ.  The  Review  was  very 
clever  indeed,  and  very  dull  indeed.  It  heavily 
taxed  the  understanding,  and  did  not  repay  in  in- 
terest. 

It  was  only  when  other  things  failed  that  Boone 


204 


REMINISCENCES. 


took  Orders,  and  became  finally  incumbent  of  St. 
John's,  Paddington.  He  was  no  great  success  there. 
I  see  that  S.  Wilberforce  went  to  hear  him,  and  pro- 
nounced his  sermon  an  essay.  It  was  not  likely  to 
be  anything  else,  but  when  so  many  educated  men 
can  write  nothing  but  essays,  it  is  to  be  hoped  they 
are  not  all  unprofitable. 

Boone  went  on  making  mistakes,  from  an  old  way 
of  pleasing  himself,  come  what  will  of  it.  He  had 
a  long  affair  with  a  young  lady,  a  member  of  his 
congregation,  who  with  her  friends  did  not  doubt, 
and  had  no  reason  to  doubt,  that  it  was  a  positive 
engagement.  A  country  relative  of  hers,  who  had 
been  in  the  Army  and  was  now  in  the  Church,  was 
not  satisfied  with  what  he  heard.  He  came  up  to 
town,  went  straight  to  Boone,  and  demanded  his  in- 
tentions. Boone  replied  that  he  had  not  had  the 
least  idea  of  marriage.  The  country  clergyman  was 
veiy  near  giving  him  a  sound  thrashing  on  the  spot, 
but  contented  himself  with  some  very  strong  lan- 
guage, and  there  the  affair  ended. 

His  share  in  the  "  British  Critic  "  I  must  leave  to 
those  who  are  better  informed  or  better  furnished 
with  documents,  and  who  have  the  eyes  and  the 
time  to  make  use  of  them. 


CHAPTER  CII. 


THE  "  BRITISH  CRITIC." 

In  the  year  1839  I  was  tied  very  close  to  my  little 
parish  in  Salisbury  Plain.  I  had  a  pupil  who  took 
much  of  my  time,  and  who  sorely  taxed  my  patience 
and  my  powers.  He  was  a  lad  of  lai'ge  fortune  and 
expectations,  but  born  under  unfortunate  circum- 
stances, and  either  neglected  from  infancy  or  natu- 
rally incapable.  Mr.  W.  Short,  of  Chippenham, 
brother  of  the  Bishop,  had  tried  his  hand  upon  him 
for  two  years,  and  had  had  to  give  him  up.  He 
was  then  sent  to  Winchester,  and  before  very  long 
Moberly  passed  him  on  to  me.  The  poor  boy  had 
natural  affection,  religious  sentiment,  a  strong  sense 
of  truth,  justice,  and  purity,  but  he  was  wholly  with- 
out tlie  power  of  learning.  If  he  went  through  a  line 
of  Virgil  a  dozen  times,  and  had  every  word  con- 
strued and  explained  to  him,  the  thirteenth  time 
would  find  him  as  ignorant  as  ever.  But  I  had  to 
persevere.  His  fixed  ideas  of  people  and  things 
were  too  grotesque  to  be  mentioned,  and  I  had  to 
give  him  better  if  I  could.  Looking  back,  I  feel 
that  I  might  have  done  more  by  addressing  myself 
more  directly  to  the  higher  part  of  his  nature,  which 
he  had,  and  which  he  also  knew  that  he  had.  At  a 
solemn  parting  he  told  me  I  might  have  done  more 
with  him  in  that  way.  He  read  chapters  of  the 
Bible  with  me  every  day,  but  wanted  more  of  the 
"  milk  for  babes." 


206 


REMINISCENCES. 


I  had  to  prepare  him  for  Oxford,  and  in  the  first 
place  to  get  him  admitted.  Collis,  of  Worcester  Col- 
lege, kindly  managed  this  for  me.  The  poor  lad 
went  to  that  college  under  a  friendly  arrangement 
that  he  was  not  to  be  examined,  or  called  upon 
in  lecture,  and  that  he  was  to  leave  in  two  years. 
He  acquitted  himself  there,  and  in  after  life,  better 
than  might  have  been  expected.  He  married  not 
imprudently.  I  met  him  and  his  wife  several  times, 
and  the  manners  and  conversation  of  the  couple 
were  quite  passable.  But  he  died  young,  leaving  a 
daughter  whose  immense  fortune  has  not  contributed 
to  her  happiness. 

Besides  this  pupil,  I  was  at  that  time  preparing 
to  build  my  new  church. 

It  was  under  these  circumstances  that  I  began  to 
write  for  the  "  British  Critic."  Any  one  who  cares 
to  turn  to  that  periodical  for  the  year  1839  must  be 
surprised  to  find  how  quickly  a  very  large  portion  of 
the  Church  of  England  had  changed  its  tone  in  a  few 
years.  Tory  and  Conservative  sentiment  was  ex- 
tinct. "  Put  not  your  trust  in  princes  "  was  the  uni- 
versal cry.  The  measures  passed,  and  the  measures 
threatened  ;  and,  more  than  all,  the  notorious  fact 
that  the  majority  of  our  Liberal  rulers  believed 
neither  in  miracle,  nor  revelation,  nor  in  a  personal 
Deity,  drove  the  Church  out  of  its  quiet  old  moor- 
ings into  the  open  and  troubled  seas.  It  was  repul- 
sion, not  attraction,  that  effected  the  change,  for 
none  knew  what  they  or  human  affairs  were  tending 
to.  The  crisis  necessarily  made  people  practical,  just 
as  a  man  who  has  been  living  an  idle  and  meditative 
life  for  months  on  shipboard,  is  all  at  once  found 
full  of  energy  and  resources,. and  indeed  possessed  of 


THE  "  BRITISH  CRITIC." 


207 


singularly  inventive  powers,  when  his  vessel  has  gone 
down  and  he  is  floating  amongst  the  wreckage. 

The  "  British  Critic,"  always  theological  and  con- 
troversial, now  became  more  polemic,  and  also  more 
political.  Its  writers  were  men  who  could  expect 
nothing  from  either  party  alternately  governing  the 
country  and  distributing  its  patronage.  Perhaps 
they  spoke  and  wrote  all  the  more  freely  because  they 
knew  they  were  not  read  by  the  people  they  talked 
at,  but  rather  by  country  clergy,  burying  their  griefs 
in  their  own  bosoms,  and  by  a  select  class  of  devout 
laymen. 

My  own  wish,  from  the  day  I  heard  that  the  "  Brit- 
ish Critic  "  was  entirely  in  Newman's  hands,  was 
that  it  should  insist  more  on  its  first  title  and  chief 
character,  indeed  that  by  which  it  was  known,  the 
British  Critic."  The  monthly  series  of  the  "  British 
Critic,"  begun  in  1814,  had  no  other  name  on  its  title 
page,  and  was  in  fact  a  very  general,  very  miscel- 
laneous, and,  I  must  add,  a  very  interesting  peri- 
odical. But  the  "  Edinburgh  "  and  the  "  Quarterly  " 
were  in  the  field,  commanding  the  ablest  and  best 
informed  writers  of  the  day,  and  the  "  British  Critic  " 
had  no  chance  with  them.  It  fell  under  the  general 
law  of  the  subdivision  of  industry,  and  accordingly 
the  new  series  had  to  claim  a  separate  character. 

This  alone  would  tell  much  against  the  interest  of 
the  publication,  but  when  Newman  took  it  up  there 
seemed  still  more  sameness  and  tediousness.  He  was 
too  much  occupied  to  contribute  largely  himself, 
and  when  he  did  write,  he  did  not  give  himself  over 
much  time.  He  desired  to  make  the  Review  the 
means  of  introducing  his  friends  and  supporters,  and 
of  giving  them  the  opportunity  to  try  their  hands  and 


208 


REMINISCENCES. 


acquire  confidence.  He  let  them  have  too  much  of 
their  own  way.  Some  of  them  would  go  on  forever 
and  ever ;  and  even  they  who  could  say  or  write  a 
short  thing  very  well  indeed,  wrote  a  long  thing,  not 
ill  perhaps,  but  so  as  no  human  being  was  ever  likely 
to  read  it  through. 

Let  it  be  borne  in  mind  that  there  was  now  issuing 
from  Oxford  (indeed,  then  from  other  centres  also) 
a  deluge  of  theological  literature,  and  that  the  writers 
were  really  beating  the  readers.  At  such  a  time  the 
"  British  Critic  "  arrives  at  a  country  parsonage  or  a 
town  reading-room.  People  are  agitated  by  daily 
news  from  Oxford,  which  they  credit  with  a  porten- 
tous significance.  Newman  is  giving  up  St.  Mary's 
and  founding  a  convent  at  Littlemore.  He  confesses, 
so  it  is  alleged,  that  he  can  no  longer  remain  in  the 
ministry  of  Enghmd,  or  indeed  in  ordinary  inter- 
course with  good  Anglican  Churchpeople.  Ward 
alone  was  enough  to  fill  the  world  with  alarms.  A 
nervous  Churchman,  who  wishes  to  go  some  way 
ahead,  but  not  to  take  a  leap  in  the  dark,  seizes  the 
Review  and  tears  it  open.  It  is  the  number  for 
July,  1840.  The  first  ninety-two  pages  are  on  the 
"  Courts  and  the  Kirk ; "  the  last  sixty-three  on 
Pauperism  and  Almsgiving,  the  two  together  being 
just  three-fifths  of  the  whole  number. 

Both  the  articles  were  worth  reading,  if  people 
could  and  would  give  time  to  them,  though  it  would 
not  be  easy  to  say  what  the  writer  of  the  first  wished 
as  regards  tlie  Kirk,  or  what  the  writer  of  the  last 
advised  as  to  Christian  benevolence.  In  this  number 
I  am  myself  at  once  a  successful  offender  and  an 
aggrieved  party,  for  Newman  squeezed  in  an  article 
of  mine  between  these  two  leviathans,  and  put  off 
another. 


THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC." 


209 


Yet  how  could  it  be  otherwise  ?  Newman  was 
contemplating  an  entire  change  of  position,  plan,  and 
direction ;  indeed,  satisfying  himself  that  he  was 
forced  thereto.  He  was  engaged  in  the  most  laborious 
works  and  keeping  up  an  immense  correspondence. 
A  small  bundle  of  his  letters,  written  about  this  time, 
remains  by  accident  in  my  hands,  and  from  one  of 
them,  written  twenty  days  before  the  publication  of 
this  very  number,  Newman  was  carefully  considering 
every  detail  of  his  intended  Littlemore  Retreat,  and 
intending  to  commence  building  at  once  ;  and  he  was 
receiving,  and  no  doubt  having  long  talks  with,  two 
old  pupils,  Samuel  Wood  and  Robert  Williams ;  a 
Presbyterian  clergyman,  a  Trinity  College,  Dublin, 
man,  a  French  ecclesiastico-political  friend  of  La 
Mennais,  a  distant  relative,  and  two  Ashantee 
princes. 

VOL.  II.  14 


CHAPTER  cm. 


LITTLEMOEE. 

In  the  "  Apologia  "  are  stated  at  length  the  reasons 
which  induced  Newman  to  withdraw  to  Littlemore. 
As  a  considerable  part  of  the  public  had  now  made 
up  their  mind  that  he  was  deliberately  and  steadily 
retreating  to  Rome,  they  very  natui'ally,  and  indeed 
not  without  some  reason,  accepted  this  as  a  half-way 
house  in  that  direction.  In  itself,  as  a  matter  of 
simple  convenience,  nothing  could  be  more  natural 
than  a  retirement  to  Littlemore,  and  had  Newman 
given  ordinary  reasons,  nobody  need  have  wondered 
at  the  step  or  criticised  it.  He  could  no  longer  do  at 
Oxford  the  work  he  had  to  do.  There  were  people 
in  and  out  the  whole  day ;  there  were  mountains  of 
work  to  be  done  ;  there  were  Fathers  and  other 
authors  to  be  read  with  continuous  and  vigilant  at- 
tention, and  foes  always  at  hand  to  pounce  down  on 
a  misquotation  or  a  mistake,  even  if  they  could  not, 
or  would  not,  do  anj'thing  else.  There  was  nobody 
to  bear  the  brunt  of  a  heavy  visitor  ;  no  secretary,  no 
younger  friend.  Newman  was  cribbed  and  cabined 
in  rooms  no  better  than  might  be  assigned  to  an 
undergraduate  with  twenty  school  books  and  as  many 
pictures  of  horses  and  ballet-dancers.  He  was  less 
and  less  at  home  in  the  college,  where  undergrad- 
uates. Fellows,  and  tutors  were  rapidly  succeeding 
one  another. 


LITTLEMOEE. 


211 


On  the  other  hand,  Littlemore  he  had  always  loved, 
and  it  remained  much  the  same,  the  only  novelty  at 
that  time  being  the  church  he  had  himself  built  there. 
It  was  his  country  parish,  a  goal  that  Oxford  men 
used  to  look  forward  to.  For  many  years  he  had 
walked  there  two  or  three  times  a  week.  He  had 
become  intimate  with  every  household,  every  living 
and  growing  thing,  and  every  stone  in  the  place. 
From  ancient  times  it  had  the  reputation  of  being  the 
best  air  and  the  healthiest  spot  near  Oxford.  Why 
should  not  Newman  exercise  the  liberty  claimed  by 
everybody  in  these  days?  A  clergyman  is  not  sus- 
pected of  sinister  intentions  if  he  changes  his  living 
for  one  where  he  will  have  less  to  do,  or  will  be  able 
to  get  others  to  do  it,  or  where  he  will  have  less  or 
more  society,  or  society  more  to  his  taste.  Nay, 
nothing  is  now  thought  of  an  incumbent  who  resides 
a  mile  or  two  away  from  his  church  and  his  people,  or 
gets  leave  of  absence  altogether,  if  he  can  only  give 
excuse  enough  to  save  appearances.  But  this  was  the 
proverbial  case  in  which  one  man  may  open  a  gate, 
walk  into  the  field,  bridle  the  horse,  and  ride  away 
with  him,  while  another  may  not  even  look  over  the 
hedge  without  suspicion.  Newman  must  have  some 
important  and  mysterious  reason  for  what  he  did. 

It  would  be  much  in  Newman's  eyes  that  this  site, 
to  which  he  had  devoted  so  much  of  his  youthful 
interest  and  strength,  was  one  of  immemorial  sanc- 
tity, connected  with  the  remotest  antiquities  and  the 
earliest  developments  of  the  University  of  Oxford. 
The  very  interesting  story  of  the  place  is  summed  up 
in  an  article  on  Ingram's  "  Memorials  of  Oxford," 
in  the  "British  Critic,"  July,  1838,  and  I  cannot  do 
better  than  quote  it :  — 


212 


REMINISCENCES. 


"  The  history  of  the  adjacent  church  (of  St.  Mary's) 
which  has  belonged  to  Oriel  College  for  above  500 
years  introduces  to  our  notice  a  sort  of  repetition  of 
the  history  of  St.  Frideswide.  A  Nunnery,  as  we 
have  seen,  formed  the  first  rudiments  of  the  Univer- 
sity, and  of  a  church  of  St.  Mary's,  on  the  banks  of 
the  Thames ;  and  a  Nunnery  some  little  way  from  it 
was  closely  associated  with  the  later  secular  schools 
out  of  which  the  present  colleges  have  arisen,  and 
with  the  second  St.  Mary's  cliurch  in  the  heart  of  the 
city. 

"  The  liberty  of  Littlemore  lies  on  an  elevated 
plain,  between  two  and  three  miles  to  the  south  of 
Oxford,  towards  London.  It  was  in  former  times 
covered  with  woods,  and  is  bounded  by  a  brook 
which  joins  the  Thames.  Situated  upon  this  brook, 
even  in  the  Saxon  days,  was  a  convent,  which  was 
rebuilt  soon  after  the  Conquest,  and  the  ruins  of 
which  still  remain,  beai'ing  the  original  Saxon  name 
of  Mynchery.  It  belonged  to  nuns  of  the  Benedic- 
tine order,  whose  devotion  to  the  advancement  of 
learning  showed  itself  worthy  of  the  ancient  I'ule 
which  they  professed. 

"  What  was  its  first  connection  with  Oxford  does 
not  clearly  appear,  but  so  much  we  know,  that  the 
church  which  Alfred  is  said  to  have  built  on  the  site 
of  '  the  present  University  church  is  incidentally 
spoken  of  as  St.  Mary's  even  as  early  as  the  Dooms- 
day Survey,  and  is  also  known  to  be  dedicated  to 
"  Our  Lady  of  Littlemore."  This  church  Alfred 
seems,  according  to  the  general  current  of  history  and 
tradition,  to  have  made  the  nucleus  of  his  assembled 
scholffi  or  places  of  education  of  which  a  religious 
idea  and  sanction  must  ever  be  the  binding  principle. 


LITTLEMORE. 


213 


From  the  west  end  of  his  church,  passing  along  his 
palace,  the  King's  Hall  of  Brasinhuse,  ran  in  later 
times  a  long  street,  called  School  Street,  up  to  the 
north  wall  of  the  city,  and  this  was  quickly  tenanted 
and  peopled  by  schools,  both  claustral  and  especially 
secular.  These  schools  were  originally  attached  to 
the  halls  there  situated,  being  commonly  the  largest 
rooms  in  them,  though  others  were  dependencies  of 
the  monastic  bodies  in  the  neighborhood,  and  were 
but  rooms  over  the  tradesmen's  shops. 

"Among  these  monastic  bodies  the  convent  of 
Littlemore  is  especially  to  be  noticed.  Besides  being 
possessed  of  the  ancient  hall,  now  called  St.  Alban's 
and  then  Nun  Hall,  south  of  the  church,  it  possessed 
schools  in  the  street  just  mentioned,  which  were 
called  after  the  name  of  St.  Mary's  of  Littlemore.'^ 

The  building  in  which  Newman  had  now  made  up 
his  mind  to  resume  the  broken  thread  of  these  noble 
traditions  was  a  disused  range  of  stabling  at  the  cor- 
ner of  two  village  roads.  Nothing  could  be  more 
unpromising,  not  to  say  depressing.  But  Newman 
had  ascertained  what  he  really  wanted,  and  he  would 
have  no  more.  He  sent  me  a  list  of  his  requirements, 
and  the  only  one  of  a  sentimental  or  superfluous 
cliaracter  was  that  he  wished  to  be  able  to  see  from 
his  window  the  ruins  of  the  Mynchery,  and  the  village 
of  Garsington. 

There  must  be  a  library,  some  "  cells,"  that  is 
studies,  and  a  cloister  in  which  one  or  two  might 
turn  out  and  walk  up  and  down,  of  course  all  on  the 
ground-floor.  The  oratory  or  chapel  was  to  be  a 
matter  altogether  for  future  consideration.  The 
library  was  the  first  thing  to  be  considered,  for  it 
was  the  nucleus  of  the  whole  establishment.    It  was 


214 


BEMINISCENCES. 


to  contain  a  large  and  valuable  librarj-,  and  it  was  to 
be  the  common  work  room.  The  cells,  some  of  them, 
were  to  open  into  it ;  and  in  that  case  the  library 
would  have  to  be  lighted  with  upper  windows.  But 
I  had  deprecated  a  library  on  the  ground-floor,  so 
Newman  suggested  that  it  might  be  placed  over  the 
kitchen  or  the  refectory,  or  might  itself  be  the  re- 
fectory, in  which  case  it  would  be  sure  of  sufficient 
airing  and  warming.  Each  "  cell  "  was  to  contain  a 
sitting-room,  say  12  by  9 ;  a  bedroom  6  by  6,  and  a 
cold  bath-room  6  by  3,  and  to  be  nine  or  ten  feet 
high.  The  librar}'  might  be  a  separate  building,  at 
right  angles,  showing  promise  of  a  future  quadrangle. 

Newman  had  bought  nine  acres,  which  he  would 
begin  to  plant  with  firs  ;  and  he  would  build  bit  by 
bit,  as  the  money  came,  or  the  inmates.  I  contribu- 
ted my  suggestions  in  a  number  of  ground-plans, 
sections,  elevations,  and  even  petty  details.  But 
Newman's  invariable  rule  was  to  do  no  more  than 
the  occasion  required,  and  he  kept  to  it  now.  He 
must  then  have  contemplated  a  very  long  stay  at 
Littlemore,  with  a  great  development,  yet  there  was 
no  affectation  of  a  grand  beginning,  like  the  enor- 
mous chancels  now  to  be  seen  all  over  the  country, 
promising  cathedrals  that  are  to  be. 

When  I  visited  Newman  and  his  two  or  three 
friends  there,  the  place  looked  outside  what  I  had 
always  knoAvn  it,  a  range  of  stables  and  nothing 
more.  I  told  Newman  that  had  I  not  been  otherwise 
engaged  I  should  have  liked  very  much  to  join  him. 
It  is  scarcely  worth  while  to  ask  how  far  I  was  sin- 
cere in  this  at  the  time,  but  I  now  feel  ver}^  sure  I 
could  not  have  endured  it  long,  though  some,  appar- 
ently as  wayward  as  myself,  seem  to  have  bowed 


LITTLEMORE. 


215 


their  stubborn  or  flighty  wills  to  this  sort  of  yoke  for 
a  whole  lifetime. 

Newman  remarks  upon  the  Oxford  folks  coming 
to  Littlemore,  peeping  and  prying  about  the  Movrj, 
and  even  making  their  way  into  it,  for  mere  curiosity. 
This,  however,  is  what  English  people  do  with  every 
convent  tliey  come  across  all  over  the  world.  It  is  a 
sort  of  unconscious  homage  to  the  religious  and  cath- 
olic character  of  such  institutions.  Perhaps,  too, 
knowing  what  private  life  is  in  this  country.  English- 
men wish  to  see  a  little  of  public  life.  Life  by  rule, 
and  for  a  high  purpose,  they  regard  as  public,  and 
therefore  open  to  all  comers. 


CHAPTER  CIV. 

THE  NEW  EDITOR  OF  THE  "  BEITISH  CEITIC." 

It  must  have  been  early  in  1841  that  I  received  a 
letter  from  Newman  proposing  that  I  should  take  his 
place  on  the  "  British  Critic."  He  had  written,  or 
was  going  to  write,  to  Rivington,  absolutely  resigning 
the  editorship,  and  naming  me  as  one  of  the  writers 
who  might  be  ready  to  undertake  it.  It  was  a  very 
great  surprise  to  me.  I  had  been  freely  criticising 
the  Review  for  some  time,  the  inordinate  length  of 
the  articles,  the  same  writers  returning  again  and 
again  with  the  same  subject  under  a  new  name,  the 
hard  work  which  the  Review  imposed  on  the  reader, 
and  a  certain  amount  of  unreality  in  some  of  the 
writers.  But  if  it  was  easy  to  criticise,  it  would  be 
so  much  the  less  easy  to  do  the  work  myself.  I 
should  have  the  same  writers,  and  if  Newman  did 
not  keep  them  within  due  bounds,  I  could  not  myself 
expect  to  do  better.  Then  there  was  the  remoteness 
of  my  position,  in  Salisbury  Plain,  far  away  from 
good  libraries ;  indeed,  without  a  reference  library 
nearer  than  London.  I  was,  too,  a  very  bad  reader 
of  books,  and  had  always  found  it  heavy  work  to 
read  and  write  at  the  same  time,  glancing  right  and 
left  alternately  to  the  printed  volume  and  the  MS. 
On  the  other  hand,  it  would  take  me  to  Oxford  some- 
times, and  to  London  sometimes,  and  it  would  pay 
my  expenses,  I  then  thought  and  intended,  besides 


THE  NEW  EDITOR  OF  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC."  217 


helping  me  to  build  my  church,  now  beginning  to 
show  itself  above  ground. 

I  think  I  had  just  braced  up  my  courage  to  accept 
the  proposal,  when  our  gardener  ran  up  to  the  window 
to  call  my  attention  to  a  mock  sun.  I  stepped  out 
into  the  garden,  and  there  it  was,  sure  enough.  It 
has  always  been  regarded  as  an  augury,  but  how  was 
I  to  interpret  it  ?  A  mock  sun  may  be  curious,  but 
it  is  a  very  poor  thing,  mere  magician's  work,  a  phan- 
tom of  the  misty  atmosphere,  neither  heat  nor  light, 
which  as  you  look  at  it  fades  away.  But  here  again 
came  a  new  question.  Granting  it  a  worthless  thing, 
how  did  that  tell  on  the  question  before  me  ?  It 
might  warn  me  not  to  try  the  part  of  an  unreal, 
unequal,  and  fugitive  imitator.  On  the  other  hand, 
if  the  thing  was  worthless,  it  was  not  worth  my  at- 
tention. Vanity  decided  the  day.  I  was  fighting 
for  my  Church  and  my  country,  and  what  better 
omen  did  I  want  than  that  ?  I  wrote,  accepting  the 
proposal,  and  soon  had  a  very  pleasant,  confiding 
letter  from  Mr.  Francis  Rivington. 

I  have  frequently  seen  mock  suns  since,  and  still 
more  wonderful  and  beautiful  atmospheric  phenom- 
ena. Why  it  is  I  know  not,  English  people,  nay,  for 
aught  I  know,  all  people,  fail  to  notice  such  appear- 
ances. They  seldom  turn  their  eyes  to  the  sky  ex- 
cept to  gather  some  weather  forecast.  I  have  men- 
tioned above  that  Newman's  eyes,  and  if  I  did  not 
add  the  Provost's  I  ought  to  have  done  so,  often 
found  a  home  and  a  consolation  in  the  visible  heav- 
ens above.  Many  years  ago  I  was  riding  in  Rotten 
Row,  on  a  day  of  watery  brightness  and  illuminated 
shade,  wind  rising,  and  storm  not  far,  when  I  saw  a 
splendid  parhelion  with  three  mock  suns,  the  middle 


218 


REMINISCENCES. 


one,  tbat  is  the  one  over  the  true  sun,  nearlj'  as  dis- 
tinct and  bright  as  the  sun  itself.  There  must  have 
been  at  that  time  a  thousand  gentlemen  and  ladies 
riding  up  and  down,  half  of  them  with  the  sun  right 
in  their  ej^es,  and  as  I  rode  the  whole  length  of  the 
Row,  I  did  not  see  one  individual  apparently  aware 
of  the  rare  and  interesting  phenomenon. 

Not  many  years  since  I  watched  for  half  an  hour 
a  brilliant  column  of  solid  crimson  light  following  the 
sun  which  had  already  set.  As  I  walked  through 
fields  and  hamlets,  I  stopped  several  fellows  to  point 
it  out  to  them.  "  Yes,  sir,  I  see,"  was  all  I  got  out 
of  them.  The  greatest  wonders  have  to  be  brought 
home  to  most  people  with  a  mechanical  foi'ce.  When 
a  tremendous  storm  salted  all  our  windows  at  Plym- 
tree  four  years  since,  thirteen  miles  from  the  sea,  I 
made  the  twenty  eldest  boys  and  girls  in  the  school 
rub  their  fingers  on  the  windows,  and  then  put  their 
fingers  into  their  mouths.  They  then  tasted  as  well 
as  saw  what  had  come  to  pass. 

But  I  must  return  to  the  "  British  Critic."  Soon 
did  I  find  that  editing  a  Review  is  a  very  different 
thing  from  criticising  it.  Newman  had  not  said  a 
word  that  I  remember  about  the  existing  staff,  but  I 
took  for  granted  they  were  to  go  on  writing.  They 
had  taken  it  for  granted  themselves.  I  wished  to  go 
on  writing  myself,  indeed  I  had  a  list  of  forty  sub- 
jects I  wished  to  write  about,  on  the  basis  of  some 
slight  stock  of  matter.  Other  writers  were  recom- 
mended. Others  recommended  themselves.  I  had 
to  deny  several.  In  about  a  year  I  told  the  gentle- 
man wlio  wrote  about  quaint  or  striking  epitaphs, 
and  who  evidently  wished  to  go  the  round  of  all  the 
churchj'ards  in  England,  that  we  had  had  as  much 


THE  NEW  EDITOR  OF  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC."  219 


of  that  as  we  could  stand  for  the  present.  Then 
there  was  the  writer  on  the  Church  and  Almsgiving, 
the  Age  of  Unbelief,  and  other  topics,  the  same 
though  not  the  same,  making  out  our  ancestors  at 
any  period  of  history  a  good  deal  better  than  our- 
selves, without  pointing  out  clearly  what  we  were  to 
do,  unless  it  were  to  give  away  everything  we  had 
and  join  the  great  mendicant  army.  I  expressed  to 
him  freely,  and  I  hope  tenderly,  ray  opinion  of  his 
article.    He  replied  in  good  taste,  and  there  it  ended. 

Sewell  had  now  retired.  Henry  Wilberforce  ceased 
to  make  an  appearance.  Other  writers  were  becom- 
ing too  busy,  the  lawyers  especially.  Keble  had 
written,  but  not  in  my  time.  There  remained  ^yard, 
Oakley,  Rogers,  John  Christie,  my  brother  James, 
Bowyer,  Church,  J.  B.  Morris,  and  some  others.  A 
gentleman,  I  believe  of  Jewish  extraction,  introduced 
to  me  by  Rivington,  wrote  an  article  full  of  Hebrew 
scholarship,  which  I  sent  to  C.  Marriott,  who  assured 
me  it  was  good  and  sound.  So  it  went  in,  but  I 
should  doubt  whether  anybody  read  it. 

The  pervading  fault  of  these  writers,  not  exclud- 
ing myself,  was  that  they  wrote  articles,  not  reviews. 
This  produced  a  want  of  variety  and  novelty.  It 
was  not,  however,  a  fault  that  told  so  much  with 
the  ecclesiastical  world  as  it  would  have  done  in 
the  political  or  the  literary.  The  great  length  of 
the  articles  was  the  most  serious  fault,  for  it  kept 
out  what  would  have  lightened  the  Review.  For 
many  years  my  idea  of  Ward  has  been  as  of  a  huge 
young  cuckoo,  growing  bigger  and  biggei%  elbowing 
the  legitimate  progeny  over  the  side  of  the  little 
nest.  But  on  reverting  to  the  volumes  I  see  that  I 
have  wronged  him.    He  was  following  the  precedent 


220 


BEIIINISCENCES. 


of  greater  offenders,  tbough  rather  like  tlie  crowd 
rushing  in  at  the  open  breach.  The  immense  diffi- 
culty of  mastering  or  attempting  to  master  his  arti- 
cles within  a  week  of  publication,  with  a  world  of 
other  things  to  do,  made  me  exaggerate  his  bulk  and 
confound  quality  with,  quantity. 

Some  people  may  be  curious  to  know  how  a  great 
organ  of  the  religious  world,  certainly  at  that  time 
commanding  many  thousand  readers,  could  be  worked 
from  the  heart  of  Salisbury  Plain,  at  a  time  when 
the  nearest  railway  station  was  at  Micheldever, 
twenty  miles  off.  Several  London  coaches  passed 
through  my  parish,  one  of  them  about  an  hour  or 
two  after  midnight,  changing  horses  a  mile  off. 
Night  after  night  I  took  my  parcel  to  the  change 
house,  and  had  sometimes  to  wait  a  long  time.  My 
practised  ears  became  quick  and  sensitive.  I  could 
always  hear  the  coach  emerging  out  of  a  depression 
and  passing  Stonehenge,  seven  miles  off;  then  rat- 
tling past  Vespasian's  Camp  into  Amesbury  ;  and 
after  changing  horses,  toiling  up  Beacon  Hill,  down 
which  it  then  came  at  a  hand  gallop.  Sound  travels 
easy  and  far  on  the  Plain.  In  a  frost  I  have  heard 
a  gig  rattling  on  for  two  hours,  that  is  for  twenty 
miles.  I  have  stood  on  Beacon  Hill  at  Whitsuntide 
and  heard  the  bands  of  seven  or  eight  villages,  and 
have  frequently  heard  the  voices  of  the  children  in 
Amesbury  market-place,  four  miles  off. 

One  night  I  was  ready  to  drop  with  terror.  The 
whole  Plain  was  suddenly  light  as  day.  It  was  a 
meteor  I  just  caught  a  sight  of  as  I  turned  round. 
That  omen,  too,  I  tried  to  decipher,  as  I  had  done 
the  mock  sun,  to  as  little  purpose.  I  thought  over 
the  contents  of  the  parcel  I  was  sending  up  to  town, 
but  I  sent  it  on. 


THE  NEW  EDITOR  OF  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC."  221 


When  it  became  necessary  to  have  some  days  in 
town,  I  went  up  by  the  mail,  arriving  about  half-past 
five.  I  had  nothing  then  to  do  but  walk  up  and 
down  Fleet  Street  till  working  hours.  On  one  occa- 
sion I  took  my  station  on  the  steps  of  Mr.  Roworth's 
office  soon  after  six,  for  the  chance  of  an  early 
arrival,  to  whom  I  could  deliver  my  MSS.  and  proofs, 
and  then  get  away  to  breakfast. 

Two  men  came  up,  one  a  big,  red-faced,  rather 
jolly  fellow,  the  other  young,  thin,  and  not  good- 
natured  looking.  They  drew  up  at  once.  "  Why, 
if  that  isn't  a  parson!  Who  ever  saw  a  parson  out 
so  early  as  that  before  ?  What  was  I  doing  there  ?  " 
I  explained  that  I  had  some  work  for  the  office,  and 
was  waiting  for  some  one  to  deliver  it  to.  I  should 
have  to  wait  till  seven,  they  said,  for  they  passed  that 
door  every  morning.  "  But  now  that  we've  got  a 
parson,  we  should  like  to  ask  some  questions."  I 
said  I  would  do  my  best  to  answer  them.  "  Now  do 
you  really  believe  that  God  Almighty  commanded 
Joshua  to  kill  all  the  Canaanites  ?  "  Yes,  I  did  believe, 
I  said,  and  saw  nothing  better  to  believe  about  it. 
"  What,"  the  red-faced  fellow  asked,  "  the  women  and 
children  too  ?  What  harm  had  they  done  ?  "  I  said 
you  might  ask  the  same  question  about  all  deaths,  all 
calamities,  and  all  punishments  in  the  order  of  nature. 
They  all  affect  women  and  children  even  more  than 
men,  and  they  all  fall  on  the  innocent  as  well  as  the 
guilty.  They  tried  to  establish  a  difference.  "  The 
commands  of  God  must  be  moral :  the  order  of 
nature  need  not  be.  It  is  the  order  of  nature  and 
nothing  more."  But,  I  said,  the  order  of  nature  is 
the  law  of  God,  and  nature  is  but  a  form  and  opera- 
tion of  the  Divine  presence.    "  But  in  nature,"  they 


222 


EEMINISCENCES. 


said,  "there  were  no  massacres,  no  cruelty,  no  re- 
venges." What,  not  in  earthquakes  and  pestilences? 
If  a  man  lives  a  bad  life,  or  lives  ill  for  only  a  short 
time  in  his  youth,  he  leaves  his  wife  and  children 
poor,  wretched,  disgraced,  and  in  many  ways  the 
■worse  for  what  he  has  done.  Much  more  passed,  for 
it  was  seven  o'clock  before  one  of  Mr.  Roworth's  men 
came  up,  and  was  surprised  to  find  a  "discussion 
foium  "  established  in  Bell  Yard.  The  big  fellow 
gave  me  his  card  —  he  was  a  journeyman  tailor  — 
and  asked  me  to  call  on  him  if  I  could  find  time. 
Alas,  I  never  did,  and  am  still  sorry  for  it.  But  I 
had  very  little  time  or  money,  and  was  afraid  of 
fresh  demands  on  them. 

Mr.  Roworth  had  had  the  printing  of  one  of  the 
great  quarterlies.  He  mentioned  to  me  several  times 
the  very  slashing  style  of  editorship  he  had  been 
accustomed  to  see.  The  editor  would  cut  down  the 
article  to  half  its  bulk ;  one  writer  in  particular,  and 
that  a  man  of  note,  was  systematically  pruned  of 
every  word  or  sentence  too  much.  The  periodical, 
the  editor,  and  the  chief  victim  recur  to  me,  but  I 
name  them  not  lest  I  should  be  making  a  mistake. 
Since  those  days  I  have  often  thought  Roworth 
meant  this  as  a  hint  to  mj'self,  but  it  did  not  occur 
to  me  at  the  time. 


CHAPTER  CV. 


THE  WRITERS  IN  THE  "  BRITISH  CRITIC." 

Very  early  did  my  troubles  begin.  I  immediately 
made  a  programme  for  the  next  number,  as  well  as  I 
could,  for  there  were  one  or  two  existing  engagements. 
I  suggested  rational  limits  to  the  writers,  indeed  with- 
out this  a  programme  was  impossible.  In  those  days 
every  quarter  produced  an  ecclesiastical  event  or  an 
important  publication,  and  for  these  I  must  reserve 
space.  I  had,  too,  my  own  hobbies,  many  indeed ; 
and  while  all  ray  hobbies  struggled  to  emerge,  the 
more  material  ones,  according  to  the  law  of  my  poor 
nature,  got  the  precedence. 

I  was  full  of  churches  and  open  timber  roofs. 
Newman  had  very  kindly  appreciated  these  articles, 
and  Rivington  had  endured  with  his  wonted  equa- 
nimity an  invasion  of  pretty  little  woodcuts  into  his 
otherwise  very  serious  and  intellectual  quarterly. 
I  entertain  a  fond  belief  that  he  became  attached 
to  these  interesting  little  Teraphim,  for  when  a  Suf- 
folk ecclesiologist,  some  years  after  the  daj's  of  the 
"  British  Critic,"  asked  the  use  of  them  for  a  pub- 
lication, he  was  unwilling  to  grant  it.  Criticisms  on 
architecture  are  unreadable  unless  the  reader  knows 
the  building  or  has  a  drawing  before  his  eyes,  so 
these  cuts  were  really  indispensable.  I  coidd  not 
have  afforded  them  but  for  a  providential  aid.  My 
good  surviving  eldest  sister  drew  them  on  the  wood, 


224 


REMINISCENCES. 


and  a  youth  in  my  father's  employment  cut  them, 
improving  very  much  as  he  went  on,  indeed  learning 
to  be  an  engraver  on  wood. 

Turning  these  illustrated  articles  over,  I  find  my 
comments  on  the  churches  were  what  I  should  now 
call  saucy,  captious,  and  occasionally  wanting  rev- 
erence most  while  affecting  it.  That,  however,  was 
then  the  prevailing  tone  of  church  builders  and  re- 
storers. They  were  the  Young  England  of  the  day, 
always  a  saucy  and  rather  foolish  creature. 

I  had  absolutely  forgotten  till  just  now,  that,  as 
much  as  forty-one  years  ago,  I  presented  the  public 
with  two  very  pretty  cuts  of  churches  within  a  mile  of 
me  as  I  write  at  Cheltenham.  One  of  these  is  Christ 
Church,  in  which  I  have  worshipped  now  for  a  year 
without  ever  remembering  that  it  was  once  the  object 
of  my  most  cutting  sarcasms.  The  other,  then  just 
completed,  has  succumbed,  after  a  brief  existence  of 
forty  years,  to  the  architectural  storm  I  helped  to 
raise,  and  has  been  taken  down  to  give  place  to  a 
magnificent  edifice  on  the  now  approved  principles. 
I  have  been  watchmg  its  progress  almost  every  day 
for  a  year,  vnthout  once  remembering  the  ill  greet- 
ing I  bestowed  on  its  newly  born  predecessor.  How 
do  these  things  pass  away,  when  one  thing  remains! 

Some  months  ago,  before  I  had  been  reminded, 
that  this  church,  St.  Philip  and  St.  James,  was  one 
on  which  I  had  bestowed  a  sort  of  malediction,  I 
paid  one  of  my  early  morning  visits  to  its  rising 
successor,  and  found  the  masons  laying  the  very  last 
cornice  stone  over  the  centre  window  of  the  south 
aisle.  It  would  be  the  last  stone  on  that  side  of  the 
building.  When  the  mallet  had  been  struck  the  last 
time,  I  felt  my  spirit  strongly  moved  to  call  the  at- 


THE  WRITERS  IN  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC."  225 


tention  of  the  masons  while  I  blessed  the  stone.  My 
courage  failed  to  do  this  audibly. 

Yet  in  my  heart,  standing  there  and  looking  on, 
I  blessed  the  stone,  the  men  that  laid  it,  the  people 
that  paid  for  it,  the  ministers  and  the  work  of  the 
church,  the  congregations,  and  all  that  ever  came  to 
worship  there  or  to  hear.  And  this  I  hei'eby  put  on 
record,  to  make  up  for  the  omission  of  what  I  might 
have"  done  more  boldly  at  the  time. 

My  first  troubles  were  with  Oakley  and  Ward.  I 
will  not  say  that  I  hesitated  much  as  to  the  truth  of 
■what  they  wrote,  for  in  that  matter  I  was  inclined  to 
go  very  far,  at  least  in  the  way  of  toleration.  Yet  it 
appeared  to  me  quite  impossible  either  that  any  great 
number  of  English  Churchmen  would  ever  go  so  far, 
or  that  the  persons  possessing  authority  in  the  Church 
Avould  fail  to  protest,  not  to  say  more.  The  cases  of 
the  two  writers  were  very  different.  Oakley  was  out 
of  my  reach  altogether  in  Liturgies  and  Ritual.  I 
could  only  put  my  finger  on  a  salient  point  of  his 
articles  here  and  there.  This  I  did,  and  he  submitted, 
evidently  intending,  however,  to  persevere  and  come 
round  me  in  the  end.  It  was  otherwise  with  Wax'd, 
I  did  but  touch  a  filament  or  two  in  one  of  his  mon- 
strous cobwebs,  and  off  ran  he  instantly  to  Newman 
to  complain  of  my  gratuitous  impertinence.  Many 
years  after  I  was  forcibly  reminded  of  him  by  a  pretty 
I  roup  of  a  plump  little  Cui)id  flying  to  his  mother  to 
show  a  wasp  sting  he  had  just  received.  Newman 
was  then  in  this  difficulty.  He  did  not  disagree  with 
what  Ward  had  written  ;  but,  on  the  other  hand,  he 
had  given  neitlier  me  nor  Ward  to  understand  that 
he  was  likely  to  step  in  between  us.  In  fact  he 
wished  to  be  entirely  clear  of  the  editorship.  This, 

VOL.  II.  15 


226 


REMINISCENCES. 


however,  was  a  thing  that  Ward  could  not  or  would 
not  understand. 

The  practical  difficulties  which  Ward  threw  in  the 
way  of  an  editorial  revision  were  great.  His  hand- 
writing was  minute  and  detestable.  It  defied  cor- 
rection. The  MS.  consisted  of  bundles  of  irregu- 
lar scraps  of  paper,  which  I  had  to  despatch  to  the 
printer  crying  out  for  copy. 

My  own  feeling  about  Ward's  articles  was  that 
they  were  witliin  comprehension  and  mastery ;  and 
that  if  I  made  the  required  effort  I  sliould  probably 
go  very  far  with  them,  but  that  I  should  find  myself 
thereby  embarked  in  an  adventure  beyond  my  con- 
trol ;  in  a  word,  that  the  terminus  of  the  articles  was 
outside  the  Church  of  England. 

Strange  to  say,  and  certainly  much  to  my  surprise, 
a  considerable  portion  of  the  readers  looked  forward 
to  Wai'd's  article  as  the  gem  of  the  number.  •  In  the 
very  letter  in  which  Robert  Williams  declined  to 
accept  my  warning  as  to  the  dangerous  character  of 
the  vaulted  roof  then  building,  as  it  was  alleged,  on 
one  of  his  favorite  models,  he  adds  in  a  P.  S.,  "  Many 
thanks  for  .  .  .  ,  as  also  for  Ward's  and  Dalgairns' 
articles ;  the  formei",  Ward's,  surely  the  most  intrin- 
sically valuable  that  has  hitherto  appeared.  It  is 
really  surprisingly  beautiful."  Think  of  that  from  a 
country  gentleman  and  a  banker ! 

I  continued  to  read  Ward's  articles  as  fast  as  they 
came  from  the  press,  not  only  from  duty,  but  with  a 
certain  pleasurable  excitement  akin  to  that  some 
children  have  in  playing  on  the  edge  of  a  precipice ; 
but  I  felt  it  would  be  idle  to  attempt  to  bring  them 
within  safer  lines.  As  for  cutting  them  short,  where 
was  one  to  commence  that  operation  when  they  were 
already  without  beg-inninor  or  end? 


THE  WRITERS  IN  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC."  227 


From  the  time  Ward  rolled  in  to  a  breakfast  party 
at  Christie's  a  few  days  after  his  coming  up  to  Oxford 
till  my  occasionally  coming  across  him  in  town,  I 
never  had  much  to  call  conversation  with  him.  Nor 
could  it  ever  have  been  of  the  slightest  use.  He  was 
a  vast  deal  too  sharp  for  me.  I  had  a  good  answer 
ready  for  him  in  time  —  that  is,  half  an  hour  too  late. 
Coming  out  of  the  old  chapel  in  Margaret  Street, 
I  tliink  about  1844,  I  found  myself  between  him, 
Oakley,  and  one  or  two  others.  We  were  soon  in 
the  thick  of  the  great  question.  How  we  arrived  at 
the  particular  point  I  remember  not,  but  I  adduced  it 
as  an  argument  against  the  system  before  us  that  in 
Roman  Catholic  countries  bandits  went  out  on  their 
expeditions  fortified  with  prayers  to  the  Madonna, 
and  with  her  pictures  or  her  medals  suspended  from 
their  necks.  Ward  promptly  replied,  "  Catch  two 
thieves  or  two  murderers  and  search  them.  One  has 
nothing  about  him  but  his  weapons,  the  other  has  a 
Madonna  tied  to  his  neck.  Which  is  there  the  most 
hope  of?  There  is  no  ground  of  hope  for  one  ;  there 
is  some  ground  of  hope  —  something  to  work  upon  — 
in  the  othei'." 

Of  course  I  might  have  replied  that  one  knew 
nothing  about  the  first,  but  that  as  to  the  second,  one 
knew  that  he  had  forraulized  religion  into  a  thing  not 
merely  worthless  but  even  wicked,  an  aid  to  robbery 
and  murder.  You  were  positively  cut  off  from  hope 
there.  Ward  will  no  doubt  have  a  reply  to  this, 
should  it  ever  meet  his  eyes. 

The  question,  however,  is  not  peculiarly  Roman 
Catholic,  for  there  is  a  too  familiar  Protestant  paral- 
lel. Of  two  ordinary  Englishmen  one  never  names 
the  name  of  God  or  recognizes  Him,  or  even  seems  to 


228 


REMINISCENCES. 


be  aware  of  His  being  and  power.  Tlie  other  takes 
His  name  in  vain  every  five  minutes  or  oftener. 
Which  is  there  the  most  hope  of  ?  Certainly  there 
is  a  basis  to  proceed  upon  when  a  man  has  continually 
invoked  the  Almighty  to  judge  between  you  and 
Him,  which  is  really  all  that  is  meant  by  £he  most 
common  form  of  profaneness.  You  may  say,  if  you 
please,  that  it 's  a  grand  theology  in  a  nutshell.  Yet 
it  is  certain  that  the  persons  and  the  classes  most  ad- 
dicted to  this  profaneness  and  most  frequently  found 
with  the  name  of  God  on  their  lips  are,  speaking 
generally,  the  least  religious,  the  least  moral,  and 
altogether  the  least  hopeful.  They  have  formulized 
their  religion  into  those  two  monosyllables,  and  taken 
their  final  stand  on  that  worship  and  that  creed. 

There  could  hardly  be  imagined  a  greater  apparent 
change  of  character  than  that  between  the  Oakley  of 
my  earliest  Oxford  recollections,  and  as  he  came  to 
have  relations  with  me.  An  elegant  and  rather 
dilettante  scholar,  translating  Lucretius  into  English 
verse,  much  at  his  piano,  and  avowedly  sentimental 
rather  than  decisive  in  his  religious  views,  he  seemed 
in  a  fair  way  to  settle  into  a  very  common  type  of 
English  Churchman.  What  was  it  that  drove  or 
seduced  him  out  of  those  pleasant,  easy  lines  ? 

The  trustees  of  the  EUerton  Theological  Prize  may 
fairly  be  charged  with  a  share  in  this  strange  trans- 
formation. As  early  as  1826  they  put  the  question, 
"  What  was  the  object  of  the  Reformers  in  maintain- 
ing the  following  proposition,  and  by  what  arguments 
did  they  establish  it  ?  Holy  Scripture  is  the  only 
sure  foundation  of  any  article  of  faith."  The  question 
was  answered  and  the  prize  won  by  Oakley.  But  at 
a  very  early  date  there  were  other  causes  at  work  in 


THE  WRITERS  IN  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC."  229 


the  whole  University,  and  specially  at  Baliol,  tending 
to  unsettle  minds  and  drive  them  in  one  direction  or 
another.  Frank  Newman  was  elected  Fellow  of  Ba- 
liol in  1826,  Oakley  in  1827,  and  Herman  Merivale 
in  1828.  The  discussions  in  the  common  room,  where 
Ogilvie  still  ruled,  were  already  becoming  unpleas- 
antly warm,  ending  in  some  of  the  Fellows  almost 
regularly  absenting  themselves.  Disjsutants  who  pull 
violently  in  one  direction  are  seldom  aware  how  much 
they  compel  their  opponents  to  pull  in  the  other ;  and 
though  Oakley  did  not  like  controversy,  still  his  sen- 
timental nature  disposed  him  to  resent  the  violence  of 
logical,  or  rather  mathematical  arguments,  and  seek 
rest  in  reaction. 

But  I  must  pass  to  the  other  writers.  My  suffer- 
ings at  the  hands  of  "Jack  Morris"  I  have  already 
described.  But  people  love  those  most  they  have 
taken  most  pains  with.  What  would  I  give  to  have 
a  day  with  him  now,  and  hear  his  searchings  and 
ramblings  into  the  region  of  the  supernatural !  not 
but  that  all  nature  was  supernatural  in  his  eyes. 

John  F.  Christie,  dear  good  man,  whose  reward 
was  not  to  be  in  this  world,  and  who  spent  himself  in 
serving  the  Church  and  his  friends,  wrote  an  article 
on  Ridley.  Somehow  he  felt  a  real  liking  and  admi- 
ration for  the  man.  I  have  to  own  that,  in  spite  of 
the  telling  illustrations  of  Mrs.  Trimmer's  "  History 
of  England,"  I  never  yet  succeeded  in  getting  up  an 
atom  of  affection  or  respect  for  the  three  gentlemen 
canonized  in  the  "  Martyrs'  Memorial "  at  Oxford. 
As  Lord  Blachford  once  observed  to  me,  "  Cranmer 
burnt  well,"  and  that  is  all  the  good  I  know  about 
him.  It  never  was  my  way  to  like  those  who  per- 
secuted, turned  out  of  doors,  and  hunted  to  death 


230 


REMINISCENCES. 


either  those  they  did  n't  agree  with  or  those  that  an 
arbitrary  monarch  might  hound  them  upon.  Like 
Newman,  I  am  disposed  to  believe  that  the  blood  of 
these  martyrs  still  cries  from  the  ground.  Christie, 
however,  like  many  good  Christians,  did  admire  and 
like  Ridley,  and,  following  the  dictates  of  his  honest 
and  simple  nature,  made  him  not  only  a  saint  but  an 
authority.  Saint  he  might  be  after  his  fashion  and 
opportunities,  but  if  the  "British  Critic"  was  to  be 
an  authority,  Ridley  was  not.  I  did  what  I  could  to 
soften  and  tone  down  the  most  repugnant  features  of 
Christie's  article,  but  I  fear  the  only  perceptible  result 
was  a  number  of  smudges  ;  and  if  anybody  will  take 
the  trouble  to  read  what  is  really  worth  reading,  and 
finds  himself  occasionally  floundering  in  a  sentence 
he  cannot  make  head  or  tail  of,  the  likelihood  is  that 
these  are  the  traces  of  my  editorial  revision.  Poor 
Christie  was  grieved  and  indignant,  but  his  deep  fund 
of  goodness  might  be  drawn  upon  to  any  amount,  and 
he  forgave,  and  I  will  hope  forgot,  what  men,  vastly 
his  inferiors,  would  have  resented  to  their  graves. 


CHAPTER  CVI. 


SIR  GEORGE  BOWYER. 

To  one  of  my  contributors  I  owe  a  separate  chap- 
ter. In  my  early  Oxford  days  one  used  to  hear  of 
Sir  George  Bowyer,  of  Radley,  who  was  ruining  him- 
self by  boring  for  coal,  and  making  a  canal  for  the 
traffic  there  was  to  be.  It  was,  I  believe,  at  one  of 
his  borings  that  Buckland,  having  been  invited  witli 
some  others  to  witness  what  was  confidentlj^  expected 
would  be  a  great  encouragement,  managed  to  drop 
some  bread  and  cheese  into  the  bore,  when  it  re- 
appeared in  the  boring  tube,  mixed  up  with  some 
loose  coal.  Sir  George  soon  found  it  more  agreeable 
to  reside  in  Italy,  and  his  sons  had  an  Italian  educa- 
tion,—  the  eldest  son  not  so  much  as  the  second. 

The  eldest  son  was  early  befriended  by  Henry, 
Bishop  of  Exeter,  and  I  believe  he  brought  a  letter 
of  introduction  from  him  to  Newman,  for  whom  he 
contributed  to  the  "  British  Critic."  He  also  pub- 
lished pamphlets.  He  had  seen  a  good  deal  of  Charles 
Albert,  whose  reverses  paved  the  way  for  Victor 
Emmanuel's  successes,  and  he  had  become  a  strong 
adherent  of  the  Sardinian  cause.  At  that  date,  in- 
deed till  long  after,  as  late  as  1848,  he  was  taking 
the  civil  side  of  political  questions,  as  opposed  to  the 
Papal.  But  an  all-embracing  policy  was  the  funda- 
mental law  of  his  mind. 

It  would  be  very  presumptuous  for  one  who  is  not 


232 


EEMINISCENCES. 


a  lawyer  to  express  any  opinion  upon  his  "  Com- 
mentaries on  the  Constitutional  Law  of  England." 
But  I  may  be  allowed  to  say  that  I  have  often  found 
it  a  book  not  only  to  be  referred  to,  but  to  be  read 
steadily,  a  chapter  at  a  time.  There  are  few  things 
of  which  an  ordinary  Englishman  is  more  ignorant 
than  the  Constitution  he  is  so  proud  of  —  its  origin, 
its  history,  and  its  existing  form.  Not  to  speak  of 
the  more  ignoble  class  of  lawbreakers,  I  cannot  help 
thinking  that  country  gentlemen,  clergy,  and  other 
persons  blessed,  or  cursed,  with  the  possession  of 
power,  would  not  be  so  proud  to  override  the  law,  to 
stretch  or  disregard  it  altogether,  if  they  knew  its 
true  majesty  and  its  awful  claims  to  their  regard.  I 
believe  I  found  myself  at  issue  with  Bowyer  as  to  his 
Imperial  predilections,  but  I  forget  whether  it  came 
to  anything  he  is  likely  to  remember. 

He  wrote  an  article  on  "Simony,"  which  I  agreed 
with  in  the  main,  but  regretted.  It  was  likely  to 
wound  weak  consciences,  and  have  no  effect  on  the 
great  majority  of  the  case-hardened.  It  is  the  gen- 
eral fault  of  the  Church  of  England  that  it  tyrannizes 
over  the  good,  and  leaves  the  bad  to  do  what  they 
please,  the  unevitable  result  of  which  is  that  the  bad 
get  the  upper  hand.  Bowyer's  article  seemed  to  me 
in  this  vicious  line,  not  in  its  principles,  but  in  its 
practical  working. 

A  most  excellent  friend  of  mine  in  Hampshire  held 
a  next  presentation  bought  for  him  by  an  aunt,  and 
he  was  serving  the  parish  as  curate  in  charge.  He 
had  built  a  new  parsonage,  and  spent  a  large  sum  on 
the  church.  Upon  reading  Bowyer's  article  he  be- 
came painfully  convinced  that  he  was  in  a  wrong 
position  as  regarded  his  living,  and,  under  the  cir- 


SIR  GEORGE  BOWYER. 


233 


cumstances,  he  felt  that  he  would  be  party  to  a  simo- 
niacal  act  in  presenting  himself  to  it.  I  could  not 
remove  his  scruples.  He  wrote  to  Bishop  Sumner, 
asking  leave  to  place  the  next  presentation  in  his 
hands.  In  doing  this  he  did  not  consider  that  he  was 
asking  the  Bishop  to  recognize  scruples  in  advance  of 
the  law,  and  of  his  own  general  practice.  That  would 
amount  to  the  Bishop  condemning  the  state  of  the 
law,  and  his  own  practice  also  in  not  going  further 
than  the  requirements  of  the  law.  As  a  rule,  people 
with  tender  consciences  must  satisfy  them  at  home. 
They  must  not  try  to  drag  in  their  more  business-like 
neighbors. 

But  there  was  another  consideration.  Under  the 
circumstances,  public  opinion  would  expect  his  lord- 
ship to  present  the  living  to  the  man  whose  conscience 
had  moved  him  to  place  it  in  the  Bishop's  hands  ; 
but  the  clergyman  was  a  High  Churchman,  and  the 
Bishop  had  a  conscience  of  his  own  against  promot- 
ing any  but  Low  Churchmen.  There  ensued  a  long 
correspondence.  How  it  was  settled  I  know  not,  but 
the  Rev.  Donald  Baynes  is  still  the  patron. 

In  town,  three  or  four  years  after  the  days  of  the 
"  British  Critic,"  I  saw  much  of  Bowyer.  Coming 
into  our  drawing-room  one  day,  he  saw  for  the  first 
time  a  Miss  Stonhouse.  She  was  more  than  twenty 
years  his  junior,  but  the  likeness  was  that  between 
brother  and  sister,  or  father  and  daughter,  indeed 
very  much  closer  than  is  often  found  in  those  cases, 
and  comprising  some  remarkable  features.  The  man- 
ner and  the  voice  were  as  much  the  same  as  the  dif- 
ference of  age  and  sex  would  allow.  An  ancestor  of 
Bowyer's  had  married  a  Miss  Stonhouse,  and  had 
thus  drawn  into  the  Bowyer  family  the  Radley  estate 


234 


EEMINISCENCES. 


and  the  bulk  of  the  Stonhouse  property.  So  these 
were  cousins  in  a  very  remote  degree,  the  common 
ancestor  being  a  Sir  George  Stonhouse,  who  lived  in 
the  reign  of  Charles  I.  However,  nature  spoke  for 
itself,  and  these  were  undoubtedly  cousins  in  blood, 
as  they  seemed  at  once  to  feel  themselves.  Bowyer 
could  not  have  been  very  well  off  himself,  but  finding 
the  young  lady  who  thus  repi'esented  tlie  old  house 
of  Radley  was  the  daughter  of  a  clergyman  with  a 
small  living  and  a  very  large  family,  he  sent  her  to 
school  for  several  years,  and  thereby  qualified  her  for 
superintending  the  education  of  her  brothers  and  sis- 
ters, for  nursing  her  invalid  mother,  and  assisting  in 
his  parish  work  a  father  whose  lameness  much  limited 
his  powers  of  locomotion. 

Sir  George  Bowyer  has  chosen  a  career  of  romance 
and  of  conscientious  self-sacrifice,  not  without  its  hon- 
orable distinctions  and  its  useful  results.  He  has  not 
been  able  to  go  all  lengths  with  the  Liberals,  or  witli 
his  Irish  friends.  He  has  contributed  much  to  I'aise 
into  life,  efficiency,  and  prominence  the  ancient  Order 
of  St.  John  of  Jerusalem,  and  in  that  capacity  to 
establish  and  maintain  a  hospital  and  chapel  in  New 
Ormond  Street.  At  Rome  he  and  his  comrades  di- 
vided with  tlie  Guardia  Nobile  the  honorable  office 
of  protecting  the  QScumenical  Council  from  violent 
or  impertinent  intrusions ;  and  in  that  capacity  he 
was  able  to  be  of  some  service,  at  its  second  public 
session,  to  her  Majesty's  present  Secretary  of  State 
for  the  War  Department,  and,  at  the  same  time,  to 
the  writer  of  these  lines. 


CHAPTER  CVII. 


MY  OWN  CONTKIBUTIONS  TO  THE  "  BRITISH  CRITIC." 

Even  if  my  memory  fail  me  as  to  other  writers,  I 
ought  to  be  able  to  say  what  I  wrote  myself.  Yet  I 
find  I  have  to  read  sentence  after  sentence  till  I  come 
upon  something  which  nobody  else  was  likely  to  say 
or  to  know.  This  is  not  creditable,  for  style  ought 
to  be  one's  own,  and  matter  ought  to  be  deep  in  the 
mind.  The  precious  memoi-andum-book  in  which  I 
carefully  noted  evei-y  change  in  the  programme  of 
the  quarter,  and  in  which  one  quarter  ended  with 
every  writer  and  every  subject  different  from  those 
entered  at  the  beginning,  has  long  since  gone  from 
my  gaze. 

In  1839,  Mr.  Osier,  a  Conservative,  and  yet  a  good 
Churchman,  had  been  recommended  to  Newman,  and 
I  wrote  for  the  April  number  a  friendly  review  of  his 
"  Church  and  King."  I  see  nothing  to  object  to  in 
it,  except  some  twaddle  here  and  there,  and  I  could 
even  read  it  through,  if  I  had  nothing  better  to  do. 
In  the  same  number  I  reviewed  Pugin's  "  Contrasts." 
It  was  easy  work,  for  the  "  Contrasts  "  are  most  un- 
fair. I  think  I  can  detect  in  the  review  a  lurking 
tenderness  for  the  Roman  Catholic  side,  even  while 
ostensibly  abusing  them.  The  Martyrs'  Memorial 
■was  in  preparation  while  this  article  was  written,  and 
Pugiu  had  made  a  rude  attack  on  the  originators  and 
subscribers.    The  architectural  part  of  the  challenge 


236 


EEMINISCENCES. 


was  fully  met,  for  the  Memorial  itself  is  worthy  of 
any  age  of  the  Church. 

For  July,  1889,  I  wrote  on  the  "  Study  of  the  Evi- 
dences," moved  thereto  by  the  great  and  still  increas- 
ing mass  of  publications  obstructing,  as  it  were,  the 
very  beginning  of  Christian  life.  Turning  over  the 
leaves,  I  see  illustrations  that  I  wish  I  had  passed  my 
pen  through,  or  put  in  some  better  form.  The  article 
is  also  too  long.  Yet  I  am  proud  to  have  written  it. 
Most  deeply  do  I  regret  to  see  this  plague  of  Evi- 
dences increasing  rather  than  diminishing.  The  num- 
ber of  foundations  conferring  a  name,  and  money, 
too,  I  suppose,  for  lectures,  has  a  pernicious  effect  in 
multiplying  books  on  Evidences,  one  like  another, 
only  generally  one  worse  than  another,  read  by  no- 
body, even  though  trumpeted  by  friendly  reviews 
which  perhaps  also  are  read  by  nobody.  Not  one  in 
ten  thousand  could  ever  have  been  really  converted, 
or  at  all  affected,  by  this  sort  of  literature,  except  so 
far  as  it  might  help  to  satisfy  a  mau  who  has  already 
made  his  choice.  He  learns  that  he  is  justified  in  it, 
and  is  not  so  utterly  foolish  as  some  people  would 
have  him. 

The  article  on  "  Temperance  Societies "  in  this 
number  is  mine.  I  hardly  know  whether  I  could 
recommend  it  to  the  perusal  of  the  Bishop  of  Exe- 
ter, who  lately  urged  me  in  common  with  the  other 
clergy  in  his  diocese  to  establish  a  Temperance  So- 
ciety in  my  parish.  Nor  could  I  even  conjecture 
whether  the  article  has  done  good  or  harm.  But 
the  same  doubt  hangs  over  the  Temperance  Societies 
themselves.  This  was  forty-two  years  ago,  and  both 
intemperance  in  its  worst  forms  and  the  general  con- 
sumption of  strong  drink  have  immensely  increased. 


MY  OWN  CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  THE  "  BRITISH  CRITIC.  237 


Since  I  have  named  the  Bishop  of  Exeter,  I  must 
add  that  he  does  the  work  of  ten  ordinary  men,  and 
certainly  maintains  a  wonderful  temper  and  cheer- 
fulness upon  no  stronger  stimulant  than  tea.  This 
he  likes  made  "  straight,"  as  he  told  me  in  answer  to 
my  inquiries,  that  is,  not  allowed  to  stand  and  soak, 
as  some  make  tea.  I  must  say  that  if  the  choice 
is  to  lie  between  never  touching  wine,  and  drinking, 
say,  three  or  four  glasses  a  day,  the  former  is  the 
best  for  health,  sense,  and  goodness,  not  to  speak  of 
the  saving  of  £25  a  year  per  head  for  some  better 
purpose. 

It  costs  me  some  diving  into  the  forgotten  past  to 
find  out  why  I  wrote  in  this  number  an  article  more 
than  forty  pages  long  on  "  Armed  Associations  for 
the  Protection  of  Life  and  Property."  How  came  I 
ever  to  think  of  such  a  subject  ?  What  occasion 
could  there  be  for  it  ?  What  place  could  it  have  in  a 
theological  quarterly  ?  It  will  be  equally  a  sui-prise 
to  most  of  my  present  readers  to  be  told  that  in  1839 
Lord  John  Russell  was  advising  loi'd-lieutenants,  mag- 
istrates, and  mayors  to  form  such  associations.  This 
was  for  the  better  classes  to  take  up  arms  against 
the  lower,  and  so  divide  England  into  two  hostile 
camps,  "capital"  the  watchword  of  one,  "labor" 
of  the  other.  I  suppose  a  recollection  of  the  part 
uniformly  played  by  the  French  "  National  Guard  " 
made  me  distrust  the  loyalty  or  the  courage  of  citizen 
soldiers.  A  few  months  before  this,  I  had  published 
a  "  Dissection  "  of  the  "  Queries  on  Education  "  cir- 
culated by  Lord  John  Russell.  These  new  circulars 
seemed  to  me  equally  insidious.  Considering  the 
subject,  the  article  is  much  too  long,  and  evidently 
written  currente  calamo  ;  but,  the  reader  will  admit, 
not  without  a  cause. 


238 


REMINISCENCES. 


In  this  number,  too,  October,  1839,  appeared  the 
first  of  my  illustrated  articles  on  "Church  Archi- 
tecture." I  see  it  is  successively  headed  "  New 
Churches  ; "  "  Mr.  Carus  Wilson's  Helps  to  the 
Building  of  Churches;"  "  Applications  of  the  Lom- 
bard Style  ;  "  "  New  Churches  in  the  Borough  of 
Stroud;"  and  "Designs  for  Rural  Churches."  The 
object  of  the  review  was  to  recommend  simplicity  of 
plan,  and  of  style,  as  at  once  the  cheapest  and  the 
least  liable  to  mistakes.  Among  other  churches  no- 
ticed with  this  intention  are  Littlemore  Chapel,  in 
its  original  state,  George  Herbert's  church  at  Bemer- 
ton,  and  the  pretty  church  just  then  completed  by 
Keble  at  Otterbourne,  in  the  parish  of  Hursley. 

In  the  January'  number  of  1840,  under  the  title 
"  Russian  Manners  and  Morals,"  I  reviewed  and 
largely  quoted  Mr.  Lister  Venables'  Letters,  describ- 
ing a  year's  residence  in  that  country.  I  wished 
to  do  full  justice  to  a  most  interesting  work,  for  I 
thought  then,  and  still  think,  that  I  have  never  read 
a  book  giving  so  good  an  account  of  the  inner  life  of 
a  strange  country.  I  had  remembered  with  much 
respect  the  author  and  his  younger  brother,  or  broth- 
ers, at  Charterhouse,  and  was  predisposed  in  his  favor. 

The  article  on  the  second  part  of  "  Fronde's  Re- 
mains," vol.  i.,  otherwise  headed  "  The  Bible  without 
Note  or  Comment,"  has  very  much  puzzled  me. 
Dipping  into  almost  every  page,  I  first  arrived  at 
the  conclusion  that  it  was  not  mine.  A  second 
perusal  brings  before  me  some  anecdotes  and  allu- 
sions in  which  I  read  myself.  On  the  whole,  the 
weak  points  of  the  article,  rather  than  its  strong 
points,  make  me  the  author.  I  think,  too,  that  I 
remember  Newman  observing  that  there  was  too 


MY  OWN  CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC."  239 


mucli  of  my  own,  but  too  little  about  Froude,  and 
that  after  largely  quoting  him,  I  went  off  to  some 
other  subject. 

In  the  July  number,  1840,  room  was  found  with 
difficulty  for  a  not  very  lengthy  article  on  "  Rui'i- 
decanal  Chapters,"  which  Mr.  Dansey  had  taken  the 
lead  in  reviving,  and  had  made  the  subject  of  some 
learned  works.  I  contrasted  them  with  the  "  clerical 
meetings "  of  that  period,  of  a  partly  theological, 
partly  social  character,  to  the  disadvantage  of  the 
clerical  meetings.  It  was  at  least  a  most  ungracious 
act  on  my  part,  for  while  I  then  knew  nothing  of  the 
working  of  "  Chapters,"  I  had  certainly  received  very 
much  pleasure,  and  instruction  too,  from  "  clerical 
meetings."  But  the  right  form,  the  true  form,  the 
old  form,  was  now  the  overruling  idea,  and  even  one's 
own  experience  was  to  go  for  nothing.  Accordingly 
I  expatiated  on  the  lax  tendencies  of  the  clerical 
meetings,  the  prominence  liable  to  be  given  to  un- 
practical topics,  the  intrusion  of  gossip,  and  the  nat- 
ural exhilaration  of  old  acquaintances  meeting  one 
another  after  a  ride  of  many  miles  in  the  cold  air. 
Of  two  things  I  have  a  painful  recollection.  One  of 
these  was  some  very  warm  discussions  with  a  very 
good  and  kind  neighbor  who  firmly  believed  the 
Temple  would  be  rebuilt  at  Jerusalem,  and  the  daily 
sacrifice  restored  and  kept  up  for  a  thousand  years. 
The  other  was  the  habit  of  some  of  the  clergy  to 
pour  into  the  ears  of  their  fellow  clergy  their  griev- 
ances and  quarrels  with  their  own  parishi'mers.  My 
own  impression  is  that  they  might  be  right  on  the 
particular  questions  at  issue,  but  that  it  was  their 
fault  the  questions  came  up  at  all,  at  least  in  the  form 
they  took. 


240 


REMINISCENCES. 


I  recently  have  been  Rural  Dean  for  seven  years, 
elected  by  my  neighbors  of  the  Deanery,  according 
to  the  custom  of  the  diocese  of  Exeter,  I  was  the 
last  Rural  Dean  of  Plymtree,  and  the  first  of  Ottery. 
In  the  act  of  taking  an  oath,  I  had  to  abolish  the 
ancient  Deanery  and  institute  the  modern  one.  It 
may  be  expected  of  me  that  I  should  say  how  far  the 
R.  D.  Chapter  supplies  the  place  of  the  clerical  meet- 
ing. Thus  far  it  does  not,  nor  could  one  venture 
to  say  how  or  when  it  is  likely  to  do  so.  There  are 
only  four  Chapters  in  the  year,  nor  is  it  possible  to 
increase  the  number  of  Chapters,  or  to  fix  any  regu- 
lar times  that  shall  not  clash  with  other  regularly 
recurrent  engagements.  With  all  the  deductions  to 
be  made,  including  a  church  service  and  long  journeys 
to  and  fro,  the  residuum  of  time  is  only  two  or  three 
hours.  If,  therefore,  the  clergy  wish  to  meet  for  the 
study  of  the  Scriptures,  or  for  devotional  purposes, 
or  for  social  purposes,  —  the  last  really  as  much  a 
necessity  of  human  life  as  the  two  others,  —  they  find 
themselves  obliged  to  supplement  the  Chapter  with 
clerical  meetings  of  one  kind  or  another,  and  in  that 
case  they  also  find  the  attendance  at  the  clerical 
meetings  more  convenient  and  more  profitable  than 
attendance  at  the  Chapter.  It  is  very  desirable  there 
should  be  some  system  of  clerical  association  and  co- 
operation, especially  where  most  wanted,  in  our  rural 
districts.  It  can  be  no  good  to  anybody  that  a  cler- 
gyman should  be  so  tied  to  his  parish  as  never  to  see 
a  clerical  neighbor,  except  for  a  few  minutes  at  long 
intervals.  So  with  the  experience  of  a  life  I  should 
write  that  article  on  Dansey's  books  very  differently 
now,  when  I  may  think  less  of  the  theory  and  more 
of  the  actual  working. 


MY  OWN  CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  THE  "  BRITISH  CRITIC."  241 


With  much  difficulty,  and  after  turning  over  every 
page,  I  have  satisfied  myself  that  the  article  on  the 
"  Religious  State  of  the  Manufacturing  Poor,"  in 
October,  1840,  is  mine  ;  but  if  the  friends  or  sur- 
vivors of  any  other  writer  can  establish  a  better 
claim,  they  are  welcome  to  it. 

In  this  number,  too,  came  out  the  second  of  my 
articles  on  "  New  Churches."  With  this,  as  a  whole, 
I  should  probably  still  agree,  with  some  reserves. 
One  little  matter  I  have  already  referred  to.  At 
pages  494  and  495  are  the  pretty  wood-cuts  of  two 
new  Cheltenham  churches,  with  needlessly  strong,  if 
not  offensive,  comments.  I  have  now  attended  the 
more  important  church  a  year,  and  for  the  same 
period  paid  daily  visits  to  the  site  of  the  other,  on 
which  a  magnificent  church  has  now  taken  its  place. 
Not  till  I  turned  to  this  article  did  I  recognize  in 
these  churches  the  objects  of  my  early  vilification, 
or  remember  that  I  had  ever  seen  them  before. 

To  the  January  number,  1841,  I  contributed  a  Re- 
view of  Dr.  Channing's  works,  such  as  I  might  now 
write,  though  perhaps  now  I  may  be  allowed  to  hope 
with  a  truer  appreciation  of  that  agreeable  but  very 
shallow  writer. 

Did  I,  or  did  I  not,  write  "  Advertisements  and 
Announcements  "  in  April,  1841  ?  None  but  myself 
could  have  been  so  courageous  as  to  transfer  "bodily 
whole  pages  of  queer  advertisements  to  a  Review. 
Somebody  told  me  I  was  rendering  the  publishers 
liable  to  a  heavy  demand  for  advertisement  duty. 
Ecclesiastical  advertisers  are  a  little  less  impudent 
now  than  they  used  to  be.  There  may  not  be  much 
to  choose  between  one  man  who  proclaims  himself 
spiritually  minded,  and  another  who  informs  the 

VOL.  II.  16 


242' 


REMINISCENCES. 


world  he  prefers  a  high  ritual  and  can  intone  ;  but 
the  assumption  is  larger  in  the  former  case  than  in 
the  latter.  An  allusion  to  the  singular  name  of  a 
religious  secretary,  one  Mr.  Stabb,  leaves  no  doubt 
on  my  mind  that  I  was  the  writer.  Bold  as  the 
experiment  was,  it  has  answered,  for  an  old  Review 
has  rather  more  chance  of  a  permanent  place  in  a 
library  than  an  old  newspaper,  and  these  advertise- 
ments and  announcements  are  now  curiosities,  not 
quite  to  be  equalled  in  our  own  times,  when  personal 
pretension  does  not  pass  without  criticism. 

In  that  number  (April,  1841)  came  out  my  first 
article  on  "  Open  Roofs."  It  may,  I  believe,  be 
regarded  as  a  beginning  in  modern  church  archi- 
tecture. There  were  then  already  some  open  tim- 
ber roofs  of  recent  construction,  but  they  generally 
showed  neither  science  nor  grace,  being  simply  a 
slight  departure  from  the  application  of  the  tie-beam, 
by  raising  it  a  few  feet  above  the  wall  plate.  There 
were  plenty  of  ancient  examples  still  extant  and  open 
to  view,  though  even  in  the  last  century  many  had 
been  destroyed  and  still  more  had  been  hidden  by 
ceilings.  But  architects  and  builders  recoiled  from 
them,  and  had  to  be  taught  that  they  were  not  only 
picturesque  but  quite  practicable,  and  that  they  need 
not  be  very  expensive. 


CHAPTER  CVIII. 

MY  OWN  CONTEIBUTIONS,  CONTUnJED. 

In  July,  1841,  I  was  editor.  The  first  article, 
on  "  Bishop  Jewell ;  his  Character,  Correspondence, 
and  Apologetic  Treatises,"  is  by  Oakley,  and  is 
considered  itself  to  mark  a  change  in  the  "  British 
Critic."  Newman  had  declined  to  be  answerable 
for  it.  I  have  no  doubt  that  he  duly  warned  me  of 
the  risks  I  should  be  incurring  by  inserting  it.  I 
knew  very  little  indeed  of  Jewell,  and  what  I  knew 
of  him  I  did  not  like.  Oakley  was  a  singularly  gen- 
tle, modest,  humble-minded  man,  and,  so  far,  there 
was  a  sort  of  personal  security  that  the  article  would 
not  go  too  far.  Certainly  some  passages  I  light  upon 
now,  after  not  seeing  them  for  forty  years,  look 
rather  impudent.  The  chances  are  that  I  did  not 
read  the  article  carefully,  except  here  and  there.  I 
shall  not,  in  this  place,  say  how  far  I  agree  with  the 
writer.  Neither  the  agreement  nor  the  disagree- 
ment of  one  who  utterly  disclaims  the  character  of  a 
theologian  would  be  worth  much,  and  all  the  world 
will  now  interpret  the  article  by  the  light  which 
the  writer  himself  threw  upon  it  by  his  secession 
to  Rome. 

Then  follows  an  article  on  an  Address  delivered 
by  Sir  R.  Peel,  on  the  establishment  of  a  reading- 
room  at  Tamworth,  and  on  letters  written  thereupon 
by  "  Catholicus,"  in  the  "  Times."    I  had  utterly 


244 


KEMINISCENCES. 


forgotten  the  article  and  the  address  for  a  whole 
generation,  till  just  now  reminded  by  opening  the 
number  of  the  Review.  I  did  not  at  the  time  know, 
though  I  half  suspected,  that  Newman  was  "  Ca- 
tholicus,"  but  was  informed  of  the  fact  some  years 
after  by  one  who  covild  not  but  know,  and  who  could 
hardly  understand  my  ignorance  on  the  point.  But 
I  have  always  made  it  a  rule  to  avoid  secrets.  I  can- 
not keep  them,  except  by  immediately  forgetting 
them  ;  and  the  communicators  of  secrets  never  in- 
tend them  to  be  kept,  thus  putting  the  persons  con- 
fided with  them  into  a  false  position.  The  article 
labors  under  the  incurable  disadvantage  of  being  a 
comment  upon  a  comment,  the  weak  echo  of  a  vigor- 
ous original.  However,  I  introduced  "  Catholicus  " 
to  speak  for  himself. 

The  last  article  in  this  nuinber,  July,  1841,  is  also 
mine.  On  June  3  the  Margaret  Professor  had  dis- 
charged in  the  Divinity  School  a  "  Lecture  "  in  his 
customary  style  against  No.  90  in  the  "  Tracts  for  the 
Times."  My  article  was  on  that  lecture,  and  also  on 
his  University  sermon  three  years  before,  republished 
with  much  additional  matter,  and  entitled  the  "  Re- 
vival of  Popery."  I  had  barely  a  fortnight  to  write 
the  article,  and  near  a  hundred  notices,  besides  read- 
ing with  some  care  the  other  contributions.  The 
apologue  of  "  Growler  and  Fido"  was  hardly  in  place 
in  the  Review.  I  have  several  times  been  told  that  if 
I  ever  expected  or  desired  promotion,  this  settled  that 
matter.  Reading  it,  however,  after  the  lapse  of  so 
many  years,  when  I  had  nearly  quite  forgotten  it,  I 
must  confess  myself  amused,  and  what  is  more,  I 
must  say  that  I  now  see  no  reason  to  regret  having 
written  either  the  "  Apologue,"  or  anything  else 
catching  my  eye  in  the  article. 


MY  OWN  CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  THE  "  BRITISH  CRITIC."  245 


If  any  apology  is  needed  for  this  peculiar  style  of 
illustration,  I  must  plead  a  singular  incident  in  my 
early  education.  From  five  to  seven  I  went  every 
day,  "  down  town,"  at  Gainsbro',  to  a  boys  and  girls' 
school,  kept  by  a  dissenting  brother  and  sister,  as- 
sisted by  the  elderly  widow  of  an  Independent  min- 
ister. Upstairs,  in  the  girls'  school,  I  had  to  sit 
under  the  lady's  three-legged  work  table,  receiving 
"thimble  pie,"  that  is  a  sharp  rap  with  a  thimble 
on  the  crown  of  my  head,  whenever  any  restless- 
ness on  my  part  disturbed'  the  rickety  table.  Going 
down-stairs  in  my  turn,  I  went  through  all  ^sop's 
Fables  — the  "application  "  in  small  type  —  with  the 
widow.  Her  mode  of  steadying  me,  and  wai-ning  me 
of  mistakes,  was  to  thump  me  on  the  back.  I  never 
got  up  a  book  so  thoroughly  in  mj  life.  The  rude 
woodcuts,  the  text  and  the  commentary,  remained 
at  the  top  of  all  I  had  ever  learnt,  or  tried  to  learn, 
for  many  years.  iEsop's  Fables  became  my  Bible, 
my  history,  my  literature,  my  art  gallery,  and  my 
natural  history.  They  burnt  themselves  out  at  last 
in  the  apologue  of  "  Growler  and  Fido." 

In  October,  1841,  editor  though  I  was,  it  cannot 
have  been  quite  spontaneous  on  my  part  that  I  wrote 
an  article  on  "New  Poetry,"  reviewing,  among  other 
poets,  Herbert  Kynaston,  and  "  the  youthful  scion  of 
the  House  of  Rutland,"  Lord  John  Manners.  In 
neither  theology  nor  poetry  did  I  ever  feel  otherwise 
than  the  angels  that  fear  to  tread  on  holy  ground. 
Compelled  as  I  was  sometimes  to  put  my  foot  on 
that  ground,  it  was  always  as  a  martyr  thrust  into 
an  arena  to  do  battle  with  a  wild  beast.  The  task 
must  have  been  forced  on  me  by  the  increasing  pile 
of  small  poetry  books.    There  was  a  difficulty  on  the 


246 


BEMINISCENCES. 


point.  I  did  not  like  to  hand  poetry  to  some  one 
who  was  no  more  a  poet  than  myself ;  and,  on  the 
other  hand,  I  had  found  poets,  that  is  small  poets,  a 
jealous,  critical,  snappish  tribe,  over-anxious  to  thrust 
out  one  another.  So  I  wrote  this  review  possibly  to 
keep  the  queen's  peace  amongst  them. 

Glancing  at  the  notices  in  this  number,  I  find  my- 
self patting  on  the  back  the  author  of  a  prize  essay 
vindicating  the  notion  of  punishment,  or  retributive 
justice,  as  a  right  instinct  of  the  human  mind,  and 
an  attribute  of  the  Deity.  The  promising  young  gen- 
tleman was  Beresford  Hope. 

By  this  time  the  offertory  and  the  alms-box  had 
both  been  revived,  the  latter  adding  a  picturesque 
feature  to  the  church.  Staying  at  Canon  Hamilton's, 
he  showed  me  a  pretty  woodcut,  as  I  supposed  it  was, 
which  he  wished  to  copy  in  an  alms-box  for  some 
church  or  for  his  private  chapel.  I  asked  the  loan  of 
it,  and  gave  it  to  my  own  woodcutter,  who  reproduced 
it,  and  there  it  is,  with  a  proper  notice,  on  the  last 
page  of  the  number.  It  turned  out  to  be  a  bad  case 
of  robbery,  and  rather  a  provoking  one.  What 
Hamilton  had  lent  me  was  not  a  cut,  but  a  drawing, 
which  he  had  paid  a  professional  artist  two  guineas 
for,  intending  a  sort  of  monopoly  in  a  unique  and 
beautiful  object.  I  had  made  it  the  property  of  the 
public,  some  of  whom  in  fact  copied  it.  Hamilton,  I 
need  not  say,  took  it  kindly ;  and  it  must  have  been 
some  years  after  this  that  I  spent  a  long  time  with 
him  in  the  "vast  basement  of  his  Canon's  house,  trying 
to  find  whether  any  part  of  it  would  make  a  domestic 
chapel. 

In  January,  1842,  I  conclude  that  I  was  making 
up  for  an  oversight  in  a  previous  number  by  a  short 


MY  OWN  CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  THE  "  BRITISH  CRITIC."  247 


and  favorable  notice  of  Miss  F.  E.  Cox's  "  Sacred 
Hymns  from  the  German."  Her  translation  of 
Wiilffer's  "  Hymn  to  Eternity "  I  have  read  many 
times  with  increasing  admiration,  and  I  hope  it  has 
left  some  fruit  in  my  mind  ;  but  I  see  more  and  more 
reason  to  disagree  with  the  idea.  It  dues  not  pass 
out  of  time,  or  land  us  in  eternity.  Neither  reason 
nor  revelation  warrants  the  notion  of  eternity  as  a 
perpetual  prolongation  of  time.  It  is  one  of  the  at- 
tributes of  Him  who  is  incomprehensible,  and  we  are 
invading  His  presence  when  we  attempt  to  measure 
His  being.  At  the  last  stroke  of  time  with  ourselves, 
or  the  world,  we  shall  find  ourselves  in  the  Divine 
presence,  seeing  things  as  they  really  are,  which  we 
cannot  do  now.  So  the  terrible  images  forming  the 
subjects  of  the  successive  stanzas  in  this  grand  com- 
position, I  cannot  but  class  with  the  hideous  concep- 
tions of  death,  hell,  the  devil,  in  which  a  basis  of 
truth  is  grotesquely  exhibited. 

In  this  number  I  am  answex'able  for  the  article  on 
"  Reserve  in  communicating  Religious  Knowledge." 
From  the  opening  sentence  it  betrays  an  apologetic 
tone,  dealing  with  the  allowable  and  proper  practice 
of  reserve  on  ordinary  occasions,  with  the  meaning  of 
the  word  and  its  derivatives,  and  with  the  fact  that 
the  very  people  who  objected  to  its  use  did  them- 
selves practise  all  sorts  of  reserves,  including  the  sup- 
pression of  doctrines  that  the  Apostle  Paul  thought 
it  necessary  to  proclaim  in  every  opening  speech. 
There  had  already  appeared  an  article  on  the  subject 
in  April,  1839,  I  am  now  told  by  R.  J.  Wilson,  but 
this  is  manifestly  in  a  different  tone.  Mine  was 
written  in  the  thick  of  the  contest  for  the  Poetry 
Professorship.    But  writing  Reviews  to  appease  con- 


248 


REMINISCENCES. 


troversial  antagonists  is  a  very  bootless  toil.  Those 
antagonists  generally  knew  nothing  of  the  tract  ex- 
cept the  single  word  Reserve,  and  it  was  necessary, 
or  at  least  respectful,  to  give  them  the  opportunity 
of  seeing  that .  reserve  was  not  always  false,  fraudu- 
lent and  vicious. 

The  next  month,  April,  1842, 1  returned  to  "  Open 
Roofs,"  and  certainly  produced  a  very  pretty  article, 
as  far  as  illustrations  could  do  it.  They  were  indis- 
pensable, and  they  have  contributed  to  a  great  archi- 
tectural restoration.  Except  I  suppose  a  majority  of 
the  notices,  I  cannot  find  that  I  contributed  anything 
to  the  July  number  this  year.  On  looking  over 
the  October  number  I  see  I  allowed  the  "  Develop- 
ment of  the  Church  in  the  Seventeenth  Century  and 
Extracts  from  its  Divines,"  to  run  to  89  pages.  I 
am  myself  answerable  for  a  long,  but  long  demanded 
and  long  promised  article  on  "  Pews,"  a  subject  on 
which  I  had  done  for  my  father,  at  Derby,  a  consider- 
able work  in  1831. 

For  the  ensuing  January  number,  1843, 1  wrote  the 
article  on  "  Agricultural  Labor  and  Wages,"  very 
much  the  old  story,  but  to  me  ever  new.  I  had  early 
cast  in  my  lot  with  rural  populations,  lavishing  upon 
them  all  I  had  of  heart,  mind,  and  worldly  gear. 
Here  I  was  on  Salisbury  Plain,  now  for  seven  years, 
with  no  other  companions,  neighbors,  or  friends 
within  five  miles.  They  were  the  only  people  I  saw 
and  talked  with,  and  visited  in  their  homes,  seeing 
and  hearing  their  troubles.  Whatever  had  to  be  done 
for  them  beyond  their  scanty  means  and  opportuni- 
ties, the  parsonage  had  to  do.  It  so  happened  that, 
as  I  had  been  the  first  resident  incumbent  within  the 
memory  of  man  at  Moreton  Pinckney,  so,  too,  was  I 


MY  OWN  CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC,"  249 


now  at  Cholderton,  and  up  to  this  time  I  went  on  tbe 
simple  and  certain  calculation  that  here  I  was  to  end 
my  days,  and  see  perhaps  the  children's  children  of 
those  whom  we  were  teaching  in  the  school.  As  a 
description  of  the  state  of  the  Wiltshire  agricultural 
population  at  that  date,  the  article,  I  feel  sure,  is  a 
true,  just,  and  valuable  record. 

Within  my  experience  no  one  ever  lived  and  did 
his  duty  for  a  long  period  among  the  agricultural 
poor  without  acquiring  much  love  and  loyalty  to 
them.  Some  one,  I  think  it  must  have  been  Froude, 
was  expostulating  with  Keble  on  the  shortness  of  one 
of  his  rare  visits  to  Oxford,  and  said,  rather  ofF-hand, 
"  Cannot  your  clodhoppers  spare  you  one  more 
day  ?  "  Keble  immediately  replied,  playfully  but 
decidedly,  "  I  won't  have  my  poor  fellows  laughed 
at." 

Of  this  I  was  reminded  many  years  after.  A 
London  incumbent  had  got  the  ofYer  of  a  Chancellor's 
living  in  a  very  desirable  part  of  the  country.  It  did 
not,  however,  answer  his  purpose  financially  to  accept 
the  living  unless  he  could  obtain  from  his  former 
patron  succession  to  his  living  for  his  son.  He  wrote 
accordingly  in  a  free  and  easy  way  to  his  vei'y  good- 
natured  patron,  saying  that  if  he  could  not  get  the 
living  he  then  had  for  his  son,  he  was  not  going  to 
bury  himself  amongst  clodhoppers.  But  if  any  one 
could  but  have  seen  the  two  men,  —  Keble,  who 
loved  and  honored  his  "  clodhoppers,"  and  this 
fellow,  who  was  preparing  to  hate  and  despise  them  ! 

In  the  notices  of  that  number,  "Views  and  Details 
of  St.  John's  Church,  Oxford,"  remind  me  of  three 
days  I  once  spent  in  that  church  with  Froude,  assist- 
ing him  in  drawings  and  measurements.   I  remember 


250 


REMINISCENCES. 


I  was  cold  enough.  But  how  these  three  days  must 
have  told  on  Froude's  attenuated  and  susceptible 
frame ! 

For  April,  1843,  I  must  have  written  on  Lord 
John  Manners'  "  Plea  for  National  Holy  Days,"  but 
I  can  only  put  it  in  the  form  of  a  likelihood,  and  shall 
not  take  it  amiss  if  it  turns  out  to  have  been  by  an- 
other hand.  If  that  should  be  the  case,  it  proves 
how  much  we  were  all  borrowing  from  one  another. 
The  question  of  national  holidays  has  undergone  a 
remarkable  change  since  this  article  was  written. 
The  Bank  holiday  is  a  thoroughly  national  holiday  in 
being  observed  by  the  whole  of  the  town  populations. 
Had  it  come  down  to  us  from  the  middle  ages  in  its 
present  form,  it  would  not  now  go  on  without  much 
criticism.  Of  course  it  causes  an  immense  additional 
pressure  on  all  the  means  of  locomotion,  and  the  per- 
sons employed  in  them,  the  very  class  already  most 
requiring  rest,  and  least  able  to  obtain  it.  A  large 
part  of  the  holiday  makers  go  to  other  towns,  which 
they  do  not  see  in  their  usual  and  natural  state  be- 
cause the  people  there  also  are  holiday  making. 
They  don't  see  the  shops,  for  they  are  closed ; 
they  don't  see  the  people,  for  they  have  gone  else- 
where. 

In  this  number  I  must  have  written  the  Review  of 
a  volume  of  sermons  by  Dr.  Doane,  Bishop  of  New 
Jersey.  The  book  had  been  urged  upon  my  notice, 
but  as  I  had  not  time  to  look  into  more  than  a  few 
pages,  I  would  rather  have  passed  it  to  some  other 
hand.  I  have  been  always  rather  too  keenly  sen- 
sitive of  the  difference  between  the  American  style 
and  the  English,  even  on  subjects  that  should 
harmonize  all  nations  and  languages.    I  feel  sure  I 


MY  OWN  CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  THE  "  BRITISH  CRITIC."  251 


accepted  the  burden,  though  my  shoulders  have  long 
forgotten  it. 

For  July,  1843,  I  wrote  the  "  Six  Doctors."  The 
article  is  not  on  the  famous  sermon,  which  had  not 
then  been  published,  but  on  the  very  remarkable  pro- 
ceeding which  resulted  in  the  Vice-Chancellor,  really 
upon  his  sole  authority,  suspending  Pusey  from  his 
legal  turns  of  preaching  for  two  years.  There  had 
been  no  trial  ;  and  if  there  had  been  even  an  exami- 
nation of  the  sermon,  that  was  a  matter  of  indiffer- 
ence, for  the  Six  Doctors  were  neither  willing  nor 
in  any  sense  competent  to  do  justice  to  the  sermon. 
None  of  them,  to  the  best  of  my  recollection,  ever 
made  any  objection  to  the  sermon,  or  gave  any  reason 
why  the  preacher  should  be  suspended,  unless  it  were 
that  this  kind  of  preaching  and  writing  excited  the 
University  and  diverted  it  from  classical  and  mathe- 
matical studies.  I  feel  very  sure  that  the  suspension 
was  as  gross  an  illegality  as  any  ever  alleged  against 
the  Stuart  kings  and  their  advisers,  or  indeed  against 
any  despot  or  pope  whatever,  any  Inquisition,  or  any 
other  secret  tribunal. 

The  excuse  is  that  there  was  a  good  deal  of  lawless- 
ness in  those  days,  and  that  all  sides  were  taking  the 
law  into  their  own  hands,  going  as  far  as  they 
thought  they  could  with  safety.  The  whole  proceed- 
ing receives  a  remarkable  comment  from  the  present 
state  of  things  in  the  University.  Has  Dr.  Pusey 
been  silenced,  or  has  his  doctrinal  system  been  pre- 
vented from  gaining  ground  ?  On  the  other  hand, 
has  the  suspension  saved  Oxford  orthodoxy  ?  How 
stands  Pusey  now,  and  hows  tands  the  University 
of  Oxford  ?  I  am  very  far  from  advocating  or  even 
desiring  this  kind  of  preaching  myself,  but  I  don't 


252 


REMINISCENCES. 


expect  to  like  every  sermon  I  hear,  and  I  should  cer- 
tainly be  often  disappointed  if  I  did.  Diversity  of 
utterance  is  unavoidable  in  this  country,  and  one's 
only  comfort  is  to  believe  that  underneath  apparent 
antagonisms  and  contradictions  there  is  a  greater  con- 
cord and  unity  than  the  speakers  themselves  even 
wish  to  imagine. 


CHAPTER  CIX. 


THE  CHURCH  OF  ENGLAND. 

The  July  number,  1843,  miglit  almost  be  called 
the  last  of  the  "  Bi'itish  Critic,"  as  far  as  I  was  con- 
cerned. Already,  before  it  appeared,  most  of  the 
writers  and  of  the  subjects  for  the  October  number 
had  been  settled  ;  the  subjects  were  such  as  would  be 
left  to  the  writers,  and  the  writers  such  as  to  take 
their  own  way  about  them.  I  was  not  likely  to 
interfere  with  Ecclesiastical  Music,  or  with  Mill's 
Logic,  or  with  Pusey's  Sermon,  the  one  made  the 
pretence  of  his  "  suspension." 

But  how  was  I  standing  myself  at  that  time  ?  That 
question  had  costume  many  anxious  days.  It  was  a 
question  to  be  worked  out  in  the  higher  regions  of 
the  mind ;  in  the  calm  atmosphere  of  devotion,  or  at 
least  meditation,  at  the  very  shrine  of  truth,  as  secure 
as  might  be  from  impulses  or  passions,  and  from  the 
sway  of  vulgar  interests.  It  was,  I  say,  to  be  worked 
out  in  this  fashion,  but  I  cannot  honestly  say  that  I 
did  work  it  out  as  I  knew  it  ought  to  be  worked  out. 
My  article  on  the  "  Six  Doctors,"  sound  and  true  as 
I  still  think  it  substantially,  was  written  as  some 
people  talk,  in  order  that  I  might  think  the  less. 
Besides  being  very  angry  with  the  Six  Doctors  I  was 
now  running  away  from  a  far  more  momentous  ques- 
tion. Upon  that  question  I  had  satisfied  myself  after 
a  fashion,  and  did  not  wish  my  satisfaction  to  be  dis- 


254 


REMINISCENCES. 


turbed.  Taking  first  one  extreme  uttei-ance,  then 
another,  in  the  article  I  had  to  pass,  I  had  asked 
mj'self,  Do  I  agree  with  this?  The  inner  response 
was  that  I  could  not  say  I  disagreed  with  it  even 
though  its  adjustment  with  the  Thirty-nine  Articles, 
and  with  my  general  duty  to  the  Church  of  England, 
might  cost  more  ingenuity  than  I  should  be  willing 
or  able  to  apply. 

But  I  cannot  remember  the  time  wlien  I  liked  the 
Thirty-nine  Articles,  or  thought  them  anything  else 
than  articles  of  peace,  and  worth  about  as  much  as 
articles  of  peace  generally  are.  I  do  not  think  that 
anybody  does  like  the  Thirty-nine  Articles.  Even  as 
a  pagan,  brought  up  in  the  faith  of  paganism,  as  we 
all  were  at  the  great  schools  of  those  days,  I  had  a 
vast  mass  of  traditionary  beliefs,  for  which  I  found 
much  more  encouragement  than  discouragement  in 
the  Bible. 

I  cannot  dispel  the  belief  that  the  great  and  good 
of  all  ages  are  now  taking  their  part  in  Imman  affairs. 
The  Christian  revelation  I  cannot  understand  to  for- 
bid or  exclude  such  a  belief.  It  rather  tells  us  the 
form  and  manner  and  medium  of  this  spiritual  coop- 
eration. They  that  are  in  Christ  never  cease  to  be  in 
Christ ;  they  are  where  He  is ;  they  are  doing  what 
He  does.  He  is  God  of  the  living,  not  of  the  dead. 
Who  can  venture  to  circumscribe  life,  and  to  say 
what  it  is  not?  Life  is  action  here.  Will  it  not  be 
action  always  and  everywhere,  and  in  fact  continu- 
ously from  the  earlier  stage  ?  True,  we  are  not  told 
much  about  the  next  stage  of  Christian  life,  but  if 
that  consideration  is  to  rule  us,  it  tells  quite  as  much 
against  a  negative  doctrine  as  against  a  positive. 

I  never  could  understand  why  in  the  first  Article 


THE  CHURCH  OF  ENGLAND. 


255 


the  Almighty  is  said  to  be  "  without  passions."  In 
the  Bible  lie  is  described  as  loving,  and  hating  ;  as 
being  jealous,  and  indignant ;  and  admiring  his  own 
works.  Church  of  England  writers  tell  us  that  these 
words  mean  nothing,  inasmuch  as  it  is  inconceivable, 
and  therefore  impossible,  that  an  Infinite  Being  should 
be  so  affected.  But  if  we  know  nothing  at  all  of 
the  nature  of  God  except  what  is  revealed,  we  have 
no  basis  for  denying  that  which  is  plainly  revealed, 
and  certainly  it  is  no  argument  against  an  alleged 
fact  that  it  is  inconceivable.  It  is  inconceivable  how 
the  Almighty  performs  all  the  operations  of  nature, 
say  within  our  own  bodies,  or  under  the  surface  of  the 
ground,  yet  as  Christians  we  cannot  deny  the  fact. 
The  instant  we  go  beyond  the  range  of  our  senses  we 
step  into  the  inconceivable.  The  human  mind  breaks 
down  tlie  moment  it  attempts  to  imagine  the  Maker 
and  Sustainer  of  the  universe  following  our  own  secret 
thoughts,  and  keeping  a  record  of  all  that  we  ever 
did,  said,  or  thougiit.  As  Christians  we  are  bound  to 
believe  it. 

I  used  to  try  to  bridge  over  the  tremendous  abyss 
by  the  conception  of  innumerable  beings,  in  infinite 
gradation  and  offices,  working  out  the  great  drama 
of  Eternity  and  Infinity  all  around  us  and  in  us. 
This  involved  an  infinite  number  of  beings,  who  in 
comparison  with  us  would  be  gods,  just  as  we  are 
gods  in  the  apprehension  of  brutes.  That  such  be- 
ings should  condescend  to  our  rank,  and  share  our 
joys  and  griefs,  and  have  to  us  the  sympathies  of 
parents,  kings,  and  great  statesmen,  is  conceivable, 
just  as  the  human  sympathies  of  Homer's  deities  are 
conceivable,  and  indeed  take  the  imagination  by 
force. 


256 


REMINISCENCES. 


The  seventeenth  Article  I  always  regarded  as  a 
piece  of  rigmarole,  and  nothing  more.  It  is  really 
put  in  the  form  of  an  interrogatory.  A  solemn  dec- 
laration that  such  or  such  a  doctrine  is  questionable 
is  a  ridiculous  and  irreverent  act.  Scripture  certainly 
declares  men  to  have  been  sent  into  the  world,  raised, 
educated,  provoked,  and  hardened  to  do  wicked  deeds; 
but  if  that  seem  very  shocking,  it  must  be  considered 
that  men  may  do  wicked  things  innocently  and  even 
virtuously,  as  they  can  also  do  good  things  worth- 
lessly and  sinfully,  as  indeed  they  often  do. 

Speaking  generally  of  the  Articles,  of  the  Cate- 
chism, and  of  large  portions  of  the  Prayer  Book,  I 
used  to  suspect  them  the  work  of  men  without  knowl- 
edge of  human  nature,  without  bowels  of  compassion, 
working  for  promotion,  and  getting  it. 

The  Church  Catechism  has  been  the  sorest  trial 
of  my  long  life.  From  youth  to  age  it  is  the  wheel 
on  which  I  have  been  racked  and  tortured.  To  me 
it  is  a  millstone  tied  to  the  neck  of  the  Church  of 
England. 

This  I  say  with  some  considerable  exceptions.  The 
explanation  of  the  Lord's  Prayer  was  the  only  form 
of  private  devotion,  in  addition  to  the  prayer  itself,  I 
used  for  many  years  of  my  early  life,  including  all  my 
school  days.  Any  Christian  might  repeat  witli  ad- 
vantage every  day  of  his  life  the  explanation  of  his 
duty  to  God,  and  to  his  neighbor.  All  the  rest  seems 
to  me  a  vulgar  attempt  to  reduce  the  Gospel  to  port- 
able and  negotiable  form.  It  cannot  be  the  natural 
instinct  of  any  true  pastor  to  make  such  a  string  of 
abstractions  the  basis  of  a  child's  religious  education. 
I  could  not  help  liking  Charles  Kingsley,  and  greatly 
admiring  most  of  his  works,  but  I  will  confess  I  never 


THE  CHURCH  OF  ENGLAND. 


257 


quite  felt  the  same  respect  for  his  moral  qualities 
after  I  heard  him  preach  at  Whitehall  a  most  ful- 
some eulogy  of  the  Church  Catechism  as  the  best 
possible  basis  of  Christian  teaching. 

These  objections  related  not  so  much  to  the  matter 
as  to  the  form  of  the  Catechism.  One  objection,  how- 
ever, I  had  always  felt  as  I  should  a  knot,  a  tangle, 
or  a  jar.  It  was  not  a  difficulty  to  carry  me  to  Rome, 
yet  it  tended  to  discontent  with  my  actual  position. 
The  triple  answer  to  the  awful  question,  "What 
dost  thou  chiefly  learn  in  these  articles  of  thy  be- 
lief?" had  long  raised,  in  my  mind  painful  difficul- 
ties. The  Apostles'  Creed  I  thought  I  understood  ; 
not  so  the  interpretations.  My  general  indolence,  or 
rather  deadness,  as  to  spiritual  matters  from  my 
childhood  had  led.  to  dogmatic  statements  lying  on 
the  surface  of  my  mind,  neither  accepted  nor  rejected, 
neither  understood  nor  questioned,  as  stones,  and  not 
things  that  lived  and  grew.  They  were  to  me  as 
precious  yet  antiquated  and  cumbersome  heirlooms  or 
family  relics,  things  kept  because  people  cannot  make 
up  their  minds  to  throw  them  away. 

It  was  with  me  a  passion  and  a  pride  to  be  ortho- 
dox ;  a  loyal  son  of  the  English  Church,  and  the 
sharer  of  her  noble  patrimony.  Tliere  are  many 
forms  and  shades  of  loyalty,  and  I  could  not  claim  a 
high  one  for  myself;  but  it  certainly  was  not  the 
loyalty  of  interest,  in  the  common  sense,  for  I  early 
conceived  an  utter  contempt  for  monej',  promotion, 
or  rank.  I  always  felt  that  the  understanding  must 
be  subordinated  to  belief,  and  that  the  nature  and 
operation  of  the  Deity  must  pass  understanding.  So, 
as  I  could  not  understand,  I  let  the  matters  of  faith 
alone,  instead  of  laboring  after  that  degree  of  ap- 

VOL.  II.  17 


258 


REMINISCENCES. 


proachment  which  it  is  doubtless  part  of  our  work 
here  to  acquire.  Learning  my  Catechism  and  Scrip- 
ture proofs  as  soon  as  I  was  eight,  and  taking  it  all 
for  granted,  I  do  not  remember  that  either  at  school 
or  at  college  I  ever  entered  upon  any  serious  doctrinal 
inquiry.  Holding  the  truth  as  I  did,  it  might  not 
much  matter  whether  I  doubted  or  not.  Yet  upon 
an  appeal  to  my  loyalty,  I  should  always  have  been 
ready  to  repel  the  imputation  of  either  bigotry  or  in- 
sincerity. 

There  was  then  the  inspiration  of  Scripture,  literal 
as  I  always  took  it  to  be,  and  as  it  was  always 
preached  in  those  days,  and  which  I  still  held  after  a 
fashion,  even  though  I  had  repeatedly  found  myself 
in  hopeless  chronological  and  historical  difficulties.  I 
tliink  I  was  more  startled  than  comforted  when  Rob- 
ert Wilberforce  once  said  he  did  not  believe  in  literal 
inspiration. 

Then  there  was  the  Athanasian  Creed.  I  could 
not  describe  the  chaotic  medley  of  notions  and  sensa- 
tions that  document  always  raised  in  me,  to  a  very 
late  date.  I  used  to  be  seriously  distressed,  indeed 
depressed,  at  the  sad  but  inevitable  fate  of  the  many 
myriads  of  poor  creatures  who  for  want  of  natural 
capacity  or  educational  advantages  would  never  be 
able  to  understand  and  accept  the  Creed,  and  who 
would  therefore  be  burnt  alive  to  all  eternity.  Could 
I  say  that  I  understood  it  myself? 

That  is  a  monstrous  conception  of  the  Creed  of 
course,  but  paradox  is  the  very  element  of  this  ex- 
traordinary composition,  wliich  the  Western  Churches 
forced  on  the  Church  of  Rome  after  a  long  and  even 
stubboi'n  resistance  on  her  part.  Reverence  long  pre- 
vented rae  from  saying  anything  about  the  Creed,  but 


THE  CHURCH  OF  ENGLAND. 


259 


the  less  I  said  the  more  I  felt.  The  notion  of  an 
eternal  and  hideous  punishment,  not  for  one's"  own 
sins  alone,  but  for  the  misfortune  of  being  descended 
from  Adam,  lay  for  at  least  half  my  life  as  an  incubus 
on  my  soul.  To  say  that  I  quite  believed  it  would 
be  too  much,  but  I  could  not  quite  disbelieve  it.  I 
was  asleep,  and  it  was  a  dream.  I  could  no  more 
argue  against  it  than  I  could  argue  against  a  tooth- 
ache.   I  might  reason  and  talk,  but  th^re  it  was  still. 

As  to  the  Articles  of  the  Creed  itself,  I  never  re- 
considered them  without  a  fresh  sense  of  difficulty. 
The  Sonship  of  Jesus  Christ  appears  most  strongly, 
definitely  and  tenderly  on  the  very  face  of  tlie  Gos- 
pels, and  indeed  the  whole  of  the  New  Testament. 
Not  to  speak  now  of  the  other  Creeds,  that  Sonship 
becomes  merely  titular  in  the  Athanasian  Creed. 
Where  the  place  arrives  for  the  definition  or  setting 
forth  of  this  unquestionable  article  of  faith,  all  we  are 
told  is  that  the  Son  is  inferior  to  the  Father  (only) 
as  touching  His  manhood.  This  would  certainly 
seem  to  imply  that  all  the  acts  of  dependence,  sub- 
mission, prayer,  and  praise  done  by  our  Blessed  Lord, 
were  human  only,  not  divine  ;  not  only  done  "in  the 
days  of  His  flesh,"  but  belonging  to  them.  Again,  I 
coidd  not  see  the  propriety  of  the  parallel  between 
the  union  of  the  body  and  soul  in  man,  and  the  union 
of  God  and  man  in  Christ.  I  once  mentioned  my 
difficulty  to  Newman,  and  he  made  some  remark  on 
the  point.  As  far  as  my  memory  can  recall,  it  was 
that  some  one  had  very  early  made  tlie  clause  a  loop- 
hole for  the  intrusion  of  heresy. 

My  natural  reliance  upon  tlie  very  letter,  and  my 
fear  lest  any  sifting  of  it  might  lead  me  further  than 
I  desired,  always  led  me  to  attach  real  and  substan- 


260 


EEMINISCENCES. 


tial  significance  to  the  words  of  our  Lord  adopted  in 
the  Communion  Service,  and  also  to  the  statement  in 
the  Baptismal  Service,  "  this  child  is  regenerate."  I 
never  could,  I  never  can,  come  to  the  conclusion  that 
they  are  only  figurative  or  only  conditional.  I  have 
earned  the  contempt  and  indignation,  temporary  I 
hope,  of  some  that  I  loved  and  admired,  by  confes- 
sions to  this  effect.  I  have  been  told  at  once  that 
such  ideas  are  not  spiritual  but  anti-spiritual,  for  tliat 
they  are  materialistic.  What  I  fall  back  on  is  this, 
we  really  know  nothing  of  spiritual  things.  When 
we  make,  as  we  are  sometimes  bound  to  make,  a  state- 
ment in  spiritual  matters,  we  have  nothing  to  do  but 
to  take  the  very  words  of  our  Lord  and  the  inspired 
writers.  These  words  we  are  bound  to  take  in  their 
simplest  and  most  natural  sense,  whether  we  iniiigine 
we  understand  their  whole  meaning  or  not;  and  we 
are  certainly  not  ourselves  competent  to  say  there  is 
no  spiritual  or  real  change  because  we  cannot  our- 
selves conceive  it  or  understand  it,  seeing  that  it  is 
in  a  matter  beyond  our  understanding. 

At  this  date,  that  is.  Midsummer,  1843,  I  had  had 
Morning  Prayer  in  my  little  church  for  six  years, 
with  the  usual  result.  Some  of  my  friends  repre- 
sented that  I  was  inconsistent  in  not  having  more 
frequent  Communions.  I  had  often  spoken  of  it  from 
the  pulpit  as  a  duty  and  a  privilege  that  we  were 
disregarding  and  losing,  but  I  could  not  doubt  what 
some  of  my  parishioners  told  me,  that  I  should  not 
increase  the  number  of  my  communicants  by  more 
frequent  Communions,  and  that  I  should  run  the  I'isk 
of  finding  none  but  myself  and  the  clerk.  It  con- 
tinually occurred  to  me,  Could  there  not  be  lighter, 
more  attractive,  and  more  varied  services  ?  But 


THE  CHURCH  OF  ENGLAND. 


261 


wliere  were  these  to  be  found,  and  who  was  there  to 
draw  them  up  ?  I  will  own  that  I  still  think  many 
of  the  prayers  and  other  forms  incm-ably  wordy  and 
tedious.  Any  man  who  in  private  life  persisted  in 
using  two  words  for  one,  and  in  repeating  himself 
continually,  would  be  avoided  as  a  nuisance,  and 
thought  an  empty-headed,  cold-hearted  man.  On 
what  ground  can  stupidities  intolerable  to  man  be 
thought  the  language  fittest  for  the  presence  of  God  ? 

When  I  came  to  compare  our  formulas  with  those 
of  antiquity,  from  which  they  are  in  fact  derived,  I 
found  the  earlier  forms  much  simpler,  shorter,  and 
more  natural.  It  appeared  to  me  that  everybody  who 
had  to  do  with  the  composition  of  the  Prayer  Book, 
from  Henry  VIII.  to  Ciiarles  II.,  addressed  himself 
to  a  select  literary  circle,  and  to  the  intellect  rather 
than  the  heart.  A  great  deal  had  been  discarded  be- 
cause it  appealed  to  the  feelings  and  the  imagination, 
and  a  more  solid  and  rational  foundation  had  now  to 
be  substituted.  This  foundation  was  believed  to  be 
found  in  an  abundance  of  good  language  —  the  admi- 
ration of  scholars,  gentlemen,  and  ladies  to  this  day. 
But  the  people  somehow  have  never  taken  to  it,  and 
it  is  only  a  small  proportion  of  religious  households 
that  prefers  the  Prayer  Book  to  all  other  devotional 
utterances. 

Again,  though  the  Articles  are  silent  on  the  point, 
yet,  generally  speaking,  it  is  the  Roman  Catholic 
doctrine  that  miracles  have  not  ceased ;  the  Protes- 
tant, or  Church  of  England  opinion,  that  they  have 
ceased,  unless  possibly  on  extraordinary  occasions.  It 
is  but  the  other  day  that,  on  a  Hospital  Sunday,  I 
found  myself  invited  by  the  hymn  we  were  bidden 
to  sing  to  inform  the  Almighty  that  He  no  longer 


262 


REMINISCENCES. 


cures  by  word  or  by  touch,  but  compels  us  to  study 
the  laws  of  nature  in  nature's  book  for  the  cure  of 
diseases.  The  writer  of  a  very  moderate  and  neutral 
hymn-book  assumes  that  to  be  the  doctrine  of  the 
Church  of  England.  Now  I  should  think  that  thei-e 
are  few  religious  people  who  are  not  under  a  strong 
and  reasonable  conviction  that  if  they  have  not  actu- 
ally worked  miracles  themselves,  they  have  witnessed 
them,  and  have  even  contributed.  There  is  a  kind 
of  miracle  which  is  not  called  a  miracle,  for  no  other 
reason  than  that  it  seems  only  a  succession  of  provi- 
dential interferences.  But  many  Christians  must 
know  of  miracles  that  may  be  projjerly  so  called. 

When  I  was  only  eleven  or  twelve  years  old,  I 
was  much  impressed  with  an  occurrence  which  at  a 
later  age  I  might  have  disposed  of  in  some  easy  fash- 
ion. My  father  had  an  old  man  in  his  employment, 
old  enough  to  have  taken  him  to  school  when  he  was 
nine  years  old.  Thomas  Hill  had  attended  John 
Wesley  in  one  of  his  peregrinations  for  three  weeks, 
taking  care  of  his  horse.  In  that  service  he  was 
likely  to  pick  up  some  sj^ecial  beliefs.  However  that 
might  be,  he  had  a  confident  belief  that  he  could 
charm  warts  away.  My  chief  friend  at  my  Derby 
school  was  Edward  Greaves,  a  handsome,  well-gi'own, 
healthy  lad,  but  with  one  hand,  the  right  I  think, 
covered  and  deformed  with  warts.  I  talked  to  him 
of  Thomas  Hill  and  his  charm.  He  consented  to  try 
it.  The  old  man  required  an  assurance  from  me, 
and  from  my  school-fellow,  that  we  were  not  trifling, 
and  that  we  had  some  faith  in  his  power.  He  did 
not  wish  to  see  my  school-fellow.  I  had  to  remember 
and  describe  the  warts,  and  whereabouts  they  were. 
They  were  thirty-seven.   In  a  fortnight  they  were  all 


THE  CHURCH  OF  ENGLAND, 


263 


gone.  What  tlie  old  man  had  done  I  know  not,  but 
wlien  I  told  him  the  result  he  showed  no  surprise.  It 
was  a  matter  of  course.  I  could  never  hear  it  boldly 
asserted  that  miracles  had  ceased  without  remember- 
ing this  incident. 

Another  instance  I  give,  occurring  as  it  did  at  the 
very  time  I  am  writing  of.  In  an  unfinished  and 
j^artly  ruinous  mansion,  not  half  a  mile  from  Cholder- 
ton  parsonage,  but  in  another  parish,  county,  and  dio- 
cese, lay  for  a  long  time  the  mother  of  a  large  young 
family,  some  time  at  death's  door.  The  family  came 
to  our  church  and  school,  their  own  being  four  miles 
off.  The  woman,  I  cannot  conceive  why,  became 
quite  sure  she  would  recover  if  she  received  the  Sac- 
rament, and  die  if  she  did  not.  She  naturally  ex- 
pected me  to  administer  it,  for  she  had  never  seen  the 
Vicar  of  her  own  parish.  Neither  had  I,  but  I  knew 
him  to  be  a  hard  cut-and-dried  "  Evangelical,"  and  I 
felt  sure  that  if  I  had  written  to  him  he  would  have 
given  the  poor  woman  talk  and  no  more..  He  would 
certainly  have  prohibited  me  from  administering. 
So,  with  due  notice,  I  administered  to  her  and  some 
of  her  neighbors.  She  immediately  recovered,  and 
was  at  church  again  in  a  few  weeks.  The  Vicar 
heard  of  it,  and  wrote  to  me  that  if  the  people  there 
wanted  spiritual  aid,  he  was  ready  to  give  it.  He 
came  over  and  made  arrangements  for  a  fortnightly 
evening  meeting  in  the  unfinished  mansion.  He  had 
a  meeting  once,  and  never  again,  —  true  son  of  an 
Established  Church,  good  to  stop  a  work  and  nothing 
else. 

I  should  not  be  bold  to  mention  such  experiences 
had  I  not  frequently  heard  the  like.  Indeed,  among 
the  religious  ideas  that  come  up  naturally  and  spon- 


264 


REMINISCENCES. 


taneously,  apart  from  cburches,  schools,  forms  of  doc- 
trine, and  controversies,  none  are  so  common  as  those 
which  testify  to  a  deep  and  universal  belief  in  the 
interference  of  the  Almighty  in  human  affairs,  con- 
tinual, and  occasionally  manifest.  Such  a  belief  may 
and  does  dwindle  into  superstition,  and  it  is  all  the 
more  likely  to  do  so  if  it  be  not  recognized,  and  if 
it  be  even  denounced,  and  so  driven  into  the  dark 
corners  of  individual  minds  as  little  fanaticisms.  It 
is  very  commonly  observed  by  objectors  that  you 
don't  hear  such  incidents  first  hand,  and  that  second- 
hand reports  are  good  for  nothing.  But  it  takes  more 
than  ordinary  courage  for  any  one  to  tell  anything  of 
the  soi't  first  hand,  for  in  the  very  act  of  telling  it  he 
is  held  by  many  to  forfeit  all  claim  to  respect  and 
even  belief. 


CHAPTER  ex. 


THE  CHUKCHES  OE  ENGLAND  AND  OF  ROME. 

What  were  tlie  leading  issues  between  the  Church 
of  England  and  the  Church  of  Rome,  as  I  had  been 
early  taught  to  regard  them  ?  Most  Englishmen 
would  exclaim  at  once  that  truth  was  the  first  point. 
The  Church  of  Rome,  they  would  say,  is  a  fabric  of 
lies.  But  already,  forty  years  ago,  all  the  party  of 
progress,  all  the  leaders  of  thought,  all  the  philosoph- 
ical institutions,  and  most  of  the  Liberal  statesmen, 
believed  the  Bible  also  to  be  a  fabric  of  lies.  The 
sacred  history,  the  sacred  canon,  and  the  sacred  text 
were  now  in  the  same  categoi-y  with  the  most  astound- 
ing Roman  legends  and  the  most  flagrant  forgeries. 
The  uncompromising  enemies  of  Rome  were  on  peace- 
ful and  friendly  terms  with  those  who  believed  the 
Bible  a  string  of  fables  and  the  Church  of  England  a 
usurpation.  But  if  I  go  farther  back,  indeed  now 
twice  as  far,  I  find  that  actnal,  indeed  inevitable, 
Liberalism  was  the  rule  of  English  societv.  In  the 
all-important  matter  of  edncation  there  was  no  help 
for  it.  For  two  years,  from  1811,  I  went  to  the  only 
good  day  school  at  Gainsbro'.  It  was  kept  by  a 
Socinian  brother  and  sister,  assisted  by  the  widow  of 
an  Independent  ministei-,  for  whose  son  my  father 
had  raised  a  subscription  to  send  him  to  Rotherliam 
College.  One  of  my  godfathers  was  a  Socinian.  We 
were  on  the  most  intimate  terms  with  the  Socinian 


266 


REMINISCENCES. 


minister,  and  his  cliildren  were  our  chief  nursery- 
friends.  The  Evangelical  curate  was  found  one  day 
standing  in  the  vestibule  of  the  Unitarian  chapel  to 
pick  up  strange  utterances,  and  great  was  the  storm 
that  fell  on  hiui.  In  the  year  1817,  I  and  my  brother 
were  going  to  the  only  classical  scliool  at  Derby, 
kept  by  a  scoffing,  clever,  and  idle  Unitarian  minis- 
ter, a  friend  of  Tom  Moore,  and  the  prophet,  teacher, 
and  guide  of  the  Strutt  family.  Towards  the  end  of 
the  week  he  used  to  be  for  hours  at  his  desk  copying 
Blair's  Sermons  in  shorthand.  Good  sermons  they 
are,  though  one  thing  they  lack. 

Most  of  the  young  people  in  Derby  or  the  neigh- 
borhood, if  their  parents  could  afford  it,  had  lessons 
in  mathematics,  penmanship,  and  cipliering  from 
George  Spencer,  mentioned  above,  a  strenuous  up- 
holder of  truth,  justice,  and  purity,  but  witliont  any 
faith  or  religion  whatever,  as  far  as  one  could  see. 
It  was  generally  complained  that  he  talked  more 
than  he  taught,  and  in  fact  made  his  lessons  the 
vehicle  of  his  opinions.  It  was  borne  because  he  was 
a  very  interesting  talker,  and  still  more  because  there 
Avas  nobody  else  to  have  in  his  place.  He  was  a 
necessity,  and  an  agreeable  one.  Truth  was  not  in 
those  days  the  supreme  object  of  contention  between 
any  two  churches,  or  between  the  Church  of  England 
and  the  dissenters  generally. 

The  next  reply  would  possibly  be  the  English  jeal- 
ousy and  fear  of  the  supernatural,  especiallj'^  when 
supposed  or  pretended  to  be  in  the  hands  of  liuman 
authorities.  The  Roman  Church  jDeopled  the  air 
with  spiritual  existences  and  powers,  by  whose  con- 
verse and  assistance  it  could  overcome  all  secular 
opposition.    This  fear  was  and  is  universal,  but  with 


THE  CIIUrCHES  OF  ENGLAND  AND  OF  ROME.  267 


strange  inconsistencies.  People  of  all  classes  believe 
in  pveternatiiral  interference,  though  of  the  most 
unaccountable,  casual,  and  even  ridiculous  kinds. 
Absurd  ideas  of  luck  are  universal.  As  I  myself  do 
believe  in  a  Providence  working  in  the  midst  of  us,  so 
I  trace  threads  of  special  causation  ever  working  to 
worthy  ends.  But  such  a  belief  is  not  confined  to 
the  superstitious.  It  creeps  out  in  the  speculations  of 
the  wisest,  unless  indeed  they  are  sitting  down  to 
write  a  book  showing  that  there  is  no  such  thing. 
The  terror  of  the  supernatural  culminates  when  the 
awful  element  is  placed  in  authorized  hands  and 
directly  associated  with  material  means  and  forms. 

A  woman  whom  I  had  often  to  see  as  a  parish  cler- 
gyman had  excused  or  overlooked  in  her  favorite  son 
crimes  and  abominations  that  it  would  take  pages  to 
enumerate,  and  had  just  been  helping  him  to  bully 
his  poor  deserted  wife  into  giving  up  some  baby 
things  she  fondly  cherished,  and  a  sum  of  money  that 
had  come  to  her  after  her  desertion,  for  the  benefit  of 
his  paramour.  More  I  could  say,  and  worse.  But 
this  woman  shuddered  with  unaffected  horror  at  the 
discovery  that  the  minister  blesses  the  water  in  the 
font  previous  to  baptism. 

The  exact  nature  of  this  horror  it  is  not  easy  to 
state,  but  no  doubt  it  has  to  do  with  the  extreme 
repugnance  felt  to  attaching  significance  to  certain 
awful  words  in  Scripture.  It  may  be  the  flesh 
shrinking  from  the  thought  of  the  Almighty  being  so 
near  and  working  by  mysterious  ways;  but  I  suppose 
it  will  be  ascribed  more  to  David's  fear  of  being 
placed  in  the  hands  of  man.  For  myself,  I  never 
could  put  bounds  to  supernatural  agency  ;  and  while 
I  could  not  commit  myself  to  positive  statements  ex- 


268 


REMINISCENCES, 


eluding  many  good  meu  from  the  very  pale  of  Chris- 
tian belief,  on  the  other  hand  I  could  not  go  along 
with  those  who  were  as  absolute  and  dictatorial  in 
their  negative  definitions.  If  I  should  ever  be  com- 
pelled to  decide,  I  would  not  be  negative  at  all 
events. 

Another  issue  there  was  between  the  two  churches, 
which  I  suppose  to  be,  with  much  change  of  form, 
the  same  that  there  has  always  been  in  this  country. 
It  is  the  question  of  spiritual  loj^alty.  Will  you  be 
loyal  to  the  Pope  or  to  the  King  ?  The  latter  alter- 
native has  come  to  mean  loyalty  to  the  Constitution, 
the  traditional  character,  and  the  customs  of  this 
countrJ^  Till  several  thousand  of  the  best  men  and 
women  in  England  had  gone  over  to  Rome,  any  indi- 
vidual venturing  on  that  step  was  a  deserter,  a  rene- 
gade, a  turncoat,  and  everything  that  was  bad,  odious, 
and  contemptible.  The  feeling  in  its  intense  form 
had  come  down  from  the  Reformation,  when  any- 
body who  disputed  the  royal  supremacy  in  spiritual 
causes  was  hung,  drawn,  and  quartered,  and  his 
head  and  quarters  stuck  up  over  the  chief  gate  of  the 
town.  The  feeling  was  renewed  and  embittered 
from  time  to  time  by  fresh  outbreaks  of  Irish  an- 
archy. 

This  loyalty,  even  if  it  were  darkness,  was  felt. 
Of  all  sentiments  loyalty  is  that  which  most  endures 
changes,  not  only  in  circumstances,  but  in  the  object 
of  its  regard.  In  the  questions  between  us  and  Rome, 
on  neither  side  is  it  easy  to  define  and  describe  the 
object  of  loyalty.  All  who  protest  against  Rome  in 
this  country  are  devotedly  loyal  to  something,  which 
they  believe  to  be  common  among  themselves,  though 
no  two  agree  what  it  is.    The  sentiment  is  indeed  all 


THE  CHURCHES  OF  ENGLAND  AND  OF  ROME.  269 


the  stronger  because  it  cannot  explain  itself,  and  is 
pi'oof  against  the  assaults  of  reason. 

Forty  years  ago,  even  more  than  now,  a  convert 
to  Romanism  had  no  future  in  this  world.  That 
showed  the  dire  character  of  the  issue  at  stake.  The 
event  proved  that  to  the  great  multitude  who  had 
joined  the  Oxford  movement,  this  was  no  terror.  It 
was  plainly  disregarded  by  the  thousands  that  went 
over,  many  not  knowing  how  they  were  to  earn  their 
daily  bread,  and  it  was  never  imputed  to  those  that 
did  not  go  over  that  they  were  deterred  by  this  ap- 
prehension. 

If  I  hesitate  to  recall  more  of  the  workings  of  my 
mind  at  tliat  critical  epoch,  if  I  even  feel  I  have  not 
done  justice  to  those  which  I  have  now  confessed  to, 
I  must  remind  my  readers  that  over  those  strange 
searchings  and  misgivings  there  have  now  ebbed  and 
flowed  for  near  forty  years  the  tides  of  a  great  ocean, 
and  there  have  rolled  to  and  fro  the  sands  of  a  great 
desert.  People  may  perhaps  remember  what  they 
saw  and  heard  forty  years  ago.  But  they  cannot  so 
easily  remember  what  they  were  themselves,  unless 
indeed  they  take  greater  pains  to  preserve  intact  and 
unchanged  a  grand  individuality  than  I  have  done. 

But  why  did  I  go  so  far,  and  why  did  I  not  go 
farther?  Why  enter  upon  arguments,  and  not  accept 
their  conclusions  ?  Why  advance  to  stand  still,  and 
in  doing  so  commit  myself  to  a  final  retreat?  The 
reasons  of  this  lame  and  impotent  conclusion  lay 
within  myself,  wide  apart  from  the  great  controversy 
in  which  I  was  but  an  intruder.  I  was  never  really 
serious,  in  a  sober,  business-like  fasliion.  I  had 
neither  the  power  nor  the  will  to  enter  into  any  great 
argument  with  the  resolution  to  accept  the  legitimate 


270 


REMINISCENCES. 


conclusion.  Even  when  I  was  sacrificing  my  days, 
my  strength,  my  means,  my  prospects,  my  peace  and 
quiet,  all  I  had,  to  the  cause,  it  was  an  earthly  con- 
test, not  a  spiritual  one.  It  occupied  me,  it  excited 
me,  it  gratified  my  vanity,  it  soothed  my  self-com- 
placency, it  identified  me  with  what  I  honestly  be- 
lieved to  be  a  very  grand  crusade,  it  offered  me  the 
hopes  of  contributing  to  gi-eat  achievements.  But 
good  as  the  cause  might  be,  and  considerable  as  my 
part  might  be  in  it,  I  was  never  the  better  man 
for  it,  and,  not  being  the  better,  I  never  was  the 
wiser.  In  fact  it  was  to  me,  all  or  most  of  it,  an  out- 
side affair. 

I  sometimes  felt  a  sort  of  parallelism  in  the  case 
of  the  Rev.  Mr.  Brown,  described  by  one  of  the 
essayists  of  the  last  century.  Though  a  good,  kind, 
and  useful  man,  an  excellent  preacher,  dutiful  in  all 
his  relations,  he  was  all  his  life  under  the  miserable 
impression  that  he  had  no  soul.  He  had  searched 
and  probed  and  found  it  not.  What  he  did  was  by 
impulse,  necessity,  law,  attraction  and  resolution  of 
surrounding  forces,  not  by  any  independent,  judicial, 
and  controlling  volition.  He  was  the  very  thing  our 
evolutionists  delight  to  imagine  themselves;  but  Mr. 
Brown,  who  had  no  philosophical  system  to  support, 
could  not  be  reconciled  to  the  want  of  a  personal 
identity.  One  may  justly  ask  what  part  of  his  nature 
it  was  that  felt  this  life-long  misery.  It  could  not  be 
his  body,  for  the  body  is  found  to  be  c;ipable  of 
getting  on  very  contentedly  without  a  soul,  or,  what 
is  the  same  thing,  without  recognizing  it.  It  must 
have  been  the  soul,  and  by  that  proof  one  is  happy 
to  feel  certain  that  Mr.  Brown  had  a  soul,  though 
smitten,  probably  from  early  years,  with  some  pain- 
ful, though  not  fatal,  infirmity. 


THE  CHURCHES  OF  ENGLAND  AND  OF  ROME.  271 

My  case  was  really  worse  than  Mr.  Bro^vn's,  for 
he  must  have  been  half  mad,  and  I,  say,  only  a 
quarter  mad,  which  made  me  more  responsible.  I 
never  doubted  I  had  a  soul,  and  on  that  account, 
perhaps,  left  it  to  take  care  of  itself.  I  was  before 
the  world  ;  I  had  enjoyed  many  special  favors  of 
Providence  ;  I  was  acting  a  considerable  part  ;  I  was 
the  companion  of  many  noble  personages  ;  I  was 
moving,  writing,  doing,  and  satisfying  myself  with 
the  work  of  my  own  hands  ;  I  was  seeing  a  great 
work  going  on  all  around  me ;  I  was  fighting  giants 
with  my  sling  and  stone  ;  I  was  exercising  functions 
important  and  appreciated  in  the  literary  and  relig- 
ious world;  I  had  always  more  contempt  than  I 
could  express  for  inferior  understandings,  even  when 
combined  with  sterling  moral  and  religious  qualities. 
But  Mr.  Brown  might  have  been  and  done  all  this 
without  a  soul,  and  without  even  discerning  the  want 
of  it. 

The  commanding  faculty,  however,  the  real  con- 
science, the  true  master  of  the  house,  that  is  the  soul, 
I  certainly  had,  as  I  still  have  ;  but  I  then  let  it, 
that  is  myself,  alone,  while  I  was  pothering  about  all 
the  world.  The  result  is,  all  I  did,  or  said,  or  wrote, 
was  under  inevitable  misguidance,  haphazard  work  ; 
excesses,  shortcomings,  needless  things  done,  needful 
things  left  undone  ;  wild  sallies,  sad  collapses,  melan- 
choly breakdowns,  driving  the  chariot  of  the  sun  in 
the  morning,  wallowing  in  a  bog  before  noon.  Even 
a  child  that  said  its  prayers  regularly,  and  examined 
itself,  and  repented  of  what  was  amiss,  would  be 
stronger  and  wiser  than  I. 


CHAPTER  CXI. 


HAVEE  AND  INGOUVELLE. 

By  the  second  week  of  July,  1843,  my  wife  had  re- 
turned from  a  course  of  visits,  in  which  she  had  sought 
for  sleep,  but  in  vain.  She  desired  to  try  more  thor- 
ough change.  Neither  she  nor  I  had  ever  been  out 
of  England.  I  provided  for  my  duty,  borrowed  j£50 
from  my  principal  tithe-payer  on  the  Micliaelmas  ac- 
count, and  drove  to  Southampton,  whence  we  crossed 
to  Havre.  In  the  passage  I  recognized  Mr.  Evans, 
the  Vicar  of  Pusey,  whose  acquaintance  I  had  made 
eleven  years  before  this.  He  was  returning  to  his 
family,  settled  for  a  time  at  Caen,  for  cheapness,  and 
for  the  language.  On  our  landing,  most  of  the  pas- 
sengers accepted  the  invitation  of  Mr.  Wheeler  to  his 
English  hotel.  There  we  had  a  wholesome  early  din- 
ner for  two  francs  a  head,  Mr.  Wheeler  himself  pre- 
siding. 

I  then  walked  up  and  down  the  quay.  No  words 
can  express  the  exhilaration  I  felt  in  the  sights  and 
sounds  of  a  new  world.  The  air  seemed  clearer,  the 
sky  brighter,  the  pace  of  life  quicker,  the  voices 
sweeter,  the  manners  and  gestures  those  of  ladies  and 
gentlemen.  The  women,  very  simply  and  neatly 
dressed  without  shawls,  with  light  caps  and  light 
shoes,  looked  as  if  they  went  in  and  out  of  their 
houses  without  change.  There  was  no  costume  to  be 
seen  here.    The  quay  was  lined  with  shops  full  of 


HAVRE  AND  INGOUVILLE. 


273 


the  things  brought  home  by  sailors  ;  every  variety  of 
caged  birds,  monkeys,  shells,  corals,  and  the  garments, 
ornaments,  and  weapons  of  natives.  The  town  is  not 
ancient.  Its  chief  antiquity  is  a  large  round  tower 
flanking  the  mouth  of  the  harbor,  built,  I  think,  by 
Francis  I.  The  general  look  of  things  is  modern  ; 
the  imposing  fortifications  —  since  levelled  —  were 
of  course  by  Vauban.  Notre  Dame  is  comparatively 
modern  and  disappointing.  I  entered  and  found 
groups  of  worshippers  all  over,  on  their  knees  at  this 
altar,  or  that  picture  or  image,  as  it  might  be.  The 
streets  were  noisy,  close,  and  hot.  The  church  was 
cool  and  quiet.  The  worshippers  came  and  went, 
sprinkling  themselves,  or  one  another,  with  holy 
water,  and  crossing  themselves. 

Going  up  the  harbor  I  came  to  a  large  dock  crowded 
with  ships,  most  of  them  with  sacred  names,  one  of 
them  St.  Augustine,  of  whom  I  was  soon  to  hear  so 
much.  The  full  figures  of  the  saints,  in  many-colored 
vestments,  adorned  the  prows.  Crowds  of  men  were 
busy  unlading  immense  bales  of  cotton.  The  town, 
as  I  soon  found,  was  full  and  overflowing  with  cotton. 
Every  coach-house  and  stable,  every  shed,  was  filled 
with  cotton  bales.  Long  trains  of  carts  were  convey- 
ing it  to  mills  in  the  interior,  each  cart  made  with  two 
poles,  thirty  feet  long,  across  the  axle-tree  of  two  enor- 
mous wheels,  forming  at  once  the  body  and  the  shafts. 
There  was  always  a  long-legged  horse  in  the  shafts,  a 
stronger  horse  before  him,  and  a  clever  little  horse  in 
front.  Whenever  these  carts  had  surmounted  a  hill, 
and  were  to  descend  the  other  side,  the  leading  horse 
and  even  the  second  also,  if  necessary,  were  detached 
from  the  front  and  attached  to  the  rear.  The  remain- 
ing horse  or  horses  in  front  were  then  made  to  ad- 

VOL.  II.  18 


274 


EEMINISCENCES. 


vance,  dragging  the  others  backwards.  If  the  down- 
ward pace  became  dangerously  rapid,  the  horse  or 
horses  in  the  rear  were  flogged  to  excite  them  to 
greater  resistance.  In  one  or  two  windows  were 
plans  of  a  contemplated  railway  from  Havre  to  Paris. 
This  surprised  me  more  than  anything  else  I  saw, 
for,  living  in  the  country  so  many  years,  I  had  settled 
into  the  idea  that  railways  were  peculiarly  English, 
and  that  Frenchmen  could  not  be  trusted  with  such 
tremendous  devices.  I  had  scarcely  believed  my 
senses  when  I  heard  some  of  the  engine-men  on  board 
our  steamer  talk  French.  Yet  I  was  gratified  to  ob- 
serve that  the  world  generally  was  learning. 

At  the  upper  end  of  the  dock  was  the  shell  of  a 
splendid  opera  house  burnt  a  few  weeks  before,  imme- 
diately after  the  performance  of  Roherto  il  Diavolo. 
The  manager,  who  had  just  gone  to  bed,  found  the 
flames  outside  his  chamber  door,  and  got  out  of  the 
window  upon  the  broad  cornice.  There  he  stood,  or 
paced,  imploring  aid,  which  was  impossible.  After 
being  half  burnt  he  threw  himself  down  and  was 
killed.  It  did  not  seem  to  me  a  proper  place  for  a 
theatre,  but  of  course  the  object  was  to  catch  the  poor 
sailors. 

After  a  night  at  Mr.  Wheeler's  we  crossed  the  forti- 
fications, and  went  up  a  very  steep,  narrow  street  into 
Ingouville,  looking  out  for  desirable  lodgings.  We 
soon  closed  with  some  a  good  way  up,  next  door  to 
a  house  occupied  by  an  English  clergyman,  his  wife, 
and  a  clever  and  pretty  daughter.  From  our  windows 
we  commanded  the  most  beautiful  view  I  had  then 
seen  in  the  world.  Since  that  I  have  seen  many  of 
the  grand  panoramas  people  travel  a  thousand  miles 
to  see,  if  haply  the  sky  favors  them,  but  this  still 


HAVRE  AND  INGOUVILLE. 


275 


holds  its  own  in  my  memory.  Havre  with  its  docks 
and  fortifications  lay  at  our  feet,  but  far  below  ;  be- 
yond lay  the  ocean  and  the  broad  estuary  of  the  Seine, 
all  alive  with  small  craft,  and  beyond  the  latter  Hon- 
fleur,  backed  by  a  range  of  hills,  and  a  famous  sailor's 
church  crowning  one  of  the  summits. 

We  had  almost  a  superfluity  of  attendance,  for  the 
wife  and  three  daughters  of  the  ship's  captain,  to 
whom  the  house  belonged,  competed  for  the  honor  and 
pleasure  of  waiting  on  us.  Adele,  Celeste  —  I  wish 
I  could  remember  the  other  name  —  were  good-look- 
ing, good-natured,  and  sprightly  girls,  whom  we  set 
down  as  fair  specimens  of  the  country.  Later  expe- 
riences lead  me  to  suspect  that  they  would  have 
amused  a  Parisian  as  much  as  they  did  us.  They 
were  always  in  and  out,  always  running  up  and  down 
the  stairs,  like  the  angels  in  a  picture  of  Jacob's  lad- 
der. If  we  asked  a  question  it  was  sure  to  involve  an 
immediate  appeal  to  the  room  below,  answered  as 
quick  and  shrill.  While  waiting  on  us  one  of  them 
suddenly  uttered  a  thrilling  scream.  It  was  to  call  tlie 
attention  of  the  family  below  to  the  feu  d' artifice  —  a 
sky-rocket  rising  from  the  town.  Our  maid  from  Sal- 
isbury Plain,  who  lived  below  with  the  family,  and 
could  not  speak  or  understand  a  word  of  French,  was 
in  a  maze  of  enchantment.  Our  clerical  neighbor  had 
been  in  his  house  for  some  time,  and  he  told  us  our 
people  were  honest  and  good,  but  that  the  education 
of  the  three  young  ladies  had  been  neglected.  How 
they  did  stare  at  us,  and,  I  must  confess  it,  how  we 
did  stare  at  them  !  I  found  it  impossible  to  keep  my 
eyes  off. 

Mr.  Bowles  very  kindly  took  ray  wife  and  child 
several  drives,  while  I  walked  ahead  into  "  the  bowels 


276 


BEMINISCENCES. 


of  the  land."  The  Tillage  roads  were  of  a  black, 
friable  earth,  which  the  least  rain  turned  into  deep 
mud.  The  fences  were  everywhere  bad.  Every 
quarter  of  a  mile  one  came  to  a  pair  of  immense 
stone  gateposts,  with  cornice  and  carvings,  to  indicate 
the  gentility  of  the  proprietor,  seldom  with  a  gate  or 
even  a  passable  road  between  them.  All  the  village 
women  had  short  petticoats,  bare  legs,  big  sabots, 
or  nalied  feet,  and  a  coarse  variety  of  the  common 
Englishman's  nightcap,  jauntily  placed  a  little  on 
one  side.  I  was  told  they  were  got  for  three-pence 
apiece  at  the  shops.  As  the  women  had  good  legs, 
held  themselves  up  well,  and  looked  you  in  the  face, 
I  could  not  have  wished  to  improve  their  costume, 
but  it  was  not  what  I  had  expected. 

In  the  outskirts  of  a  village  I  came  on  a  sight 
which  might  serve  to  allay  the  prevailing  panic  of 
France  flooding  us  with  cheap  corn.  In  a  triangular 
bit  of  ground,  may  be  an  acre,  not  more,  an  old  man, 
his  wife,  and  a  lad,  were  in  difficulties  with  a  plough, 
furnished  with  two  wheels  as  big  as  those  of  a  coster- 
mongei-'s  cart,  and  drawn  by  a  lean  horse,  a  cow,  and 
an  ass.  Not  only  at  the  end  of  every  furrow,  but  in 
the  middle  of  it,  the  whole  apparatus  fell  out  of  gear, 
and  a  council  of  war  was  held  to  consider  what  under 
the  circumstances  was  best  to  be  done.  The  two 
farmers  I  had  left  in  Salisbury  Plain  had,  one  a 
thousand  acres,  the  other  six  hundred ;  with  I  am 
afraid  to  say  how  many  good  horses.  Here  was 
the  bugbear  our  knavish  politicians  were  frightening 
them  with.  I  tried  to  work  out  the  problem  before 
me  to  its  economical  results,  but  did  not  succeed  in 
making  it  out  quite  so  absurd  as  I  expected.  If  these 
people  had  no  money,  or  not  enough  to  run  any  risks 


HAVRE  AND  INGOUVILLE. 


277 


with,  they  could  only  do  their  best  with  the  materials 
on  hand,  namely,  their  three  selves,  the  three  ani- 
mals, the  rickety  old  plough,  and  fodder  enough  to 
keep  the  cow  in  milk  and  the  other  creatures  on 
their  legs.  The  interior  of  the  plateau  over  Havre 
was  not  picturesque,  and  even  France  I  found  could 
be  dull. 

Our  cooking  at  Ingouville  was  of  course  oily,  and 
my  invalid  wife  could  not  touch  it.  She  soon  felt  a 
craving  for  English  fare.  Was  there  such  ji  thing  as 
an  English  ham  in  Havre  ?  Failing  that,  she  must 
have  some  English  cheese.  I  spent  some  hours  in 
investigating  the  food  resources  of  this  populous  town. 
As  to  the  ham,  I  started  with  a  misgiving,  for  I  had 
not  seen  a  fat  pig  since  we  had  landed.  There  were 
hams  in  the  shops  that  looked  like  hard  brown  stones 
picked  up  from  the  seashore.  I  expressly  asked  for 
an  English  ham.  There  had  never  been  such  a 
thing  in  Havre,  they  assured  me.  Why  send  to 
England  for  hams,  when  they  had  too  many  pigs  at 
home  ? 

I  had  to  fall  back  on  cheese.  I  walked  twice  up 
and  down  the  chief  street,  and  several  streets  inter- 
secting it,  and  could  not  see  anything  an  Englishman 
would  admit  to  be  cheese,  or  could  mistake  for  it. 
When  I  asked  for  cheese  I  was  referred  to  the 
market  women,  who  exhibited  in  their  barrows  what 
looked  like  crumpets.  Venturing  to  ask  one  of  them 
what  sort  of  cheese  it  was,  she  instantly,  without 
giving  me  time  to  get  out- of  the  way,  cut  one  in  two, 
when  there  came  out  a  stench  which  even  now,  at  the 
remembrance,  comes  up  to  my  nose.  At  last  some- 
thing in  a  glass  case  caught  my  eye.  It  might  be  a 
very  ancient  piece  of  cheese.    So  it  was.    It  scarcely 


278 


REMINISCENCES. 


held  together.  There  was  a  pound  of  it.  I  asked 
the  price.  Had  it  been  fresh,  the  price  would  have 
been  three  francs,  that  is  half-a-crown.  But  I  might 
have  it  for  two  francs,  that  is  one  and  eight-pence.  I 
declined,  and  had  to  return  home  empty-handed. 

Mr.  Bowles  had  brought  with  him  to  France  an 
open  carriage  and  a  good  horse.  He  soon  found 
himself  in  a  gi'eat  difficulty.  The  pedestrians  occu- 
pied the  whole  of  the  narrow  streets,  whether  moving 
or  standing  in  groups.  They  got  out  of  the  way  for 
the  public  cabs,  but  not  for  the  foreigner,  —  so  he  im- 
agined. Complaining  of  this  to  a  French  gentleman, 
he  was  told  that  if  he  drove  as  fast  as  the  cabmen 
he  would  find  the  course  as  clear  as  they  did.  The 
fact  was  he  had  been  creeping  along  at  a  snail's  pace 
for  fear  of  accidents,  and  they  were  not  used  to  it. 
After  that  he  rattled  down  the  descent  into  Havre, 
and  never  hurt  anybody  or  had  an  angry  word. 

This  will  remind  many  of  my  readers  of  the  horse 
races,  as  they  are  called,  in  the  Roman  Carnival, 
The  horses,  without  riders,  and  infuriated  by  squibs 
and  crackers  going  off  all  about  them,  gallop  the 
length  of  the  Corso,  so  closely  packed  with  people 
as  to  seem  incapable  of  holding  anything  more.  As 
the  horses'  hoofs  and  the  shouts  of  the  crowd  draw 
nearer,  the  people  jump  right  and  left,  just  in  time, 
and  immediately  close  again  when  the  animals  have 
gone  by. 

Passing  through  M.  Normand's  shipbuilding  yard, 
I  noticed  something  queer  in  the  framework  of  a 
small  ship  on  the  stocks.  It  was  an  experimental 
screw  steamer  ;  one  of  the  first. 


CHAPTER  CXIL 


CAEN. 

After  a  foi-tnight  at  Ingouville  we  went  by  sea  to 
Caen.  Crossing  the  mouth  of  the  Seine,  and  steam- 
ing up  the  Orne,  we  saw  by  the  way  the  little  chance 
Napoleon  had  of  making  Caen  a  considerable  port. 
The  general  view  of  the  city  is  justly  compared  by 
tourists  to  that  of  Oxford.  There  are  even  more 
church  towers  and  fipe  buildings  of  all  ages.  The 
stone,  properly  selected  and  managed,  is  about  the 
best  in  the  world,  at  least  for  a  pure  atmosphere. 
The  old  town  is  built  upon  a  rock ;  the  new  town  on 
a  bog,  the  result  being  that,  as  at  Pisa,  thei'e  is  hardly 
a  perpendicular  or  horizontal  line  in  it. 

It  was  taken  for  granted  that  we  were  come  to  see 
the  races,  to  be  run  in  the  hippodrome,  a  mile  course, 
if  so  much,  on  a  meadow  close  to  the  new  town.  We 
looked  out  for  lodgings  cheap  and  picturesque,  and 
were  prepared  to  pay  for  it  "  by  the  nose."  These  we 
found  at  M.  Marie's,  a  plumber  and  glazier,  in  Place 
de  Vancienne  Boucherie,  just  opposite  the  famous  Ab- 
haye  aux  hommes,  and  a  pile  of  buildings  which  we 
understood  to  be  the  remains  of  the  old  ducal  palace. 
M.  Marie's  wife  was  Marie,  and  his  only  child  Marie, 
seven  or  eight  years  old,  still  wearing  her  Confirma- 
tion dress.  Every  room  in  the  house  was  floored  with 
tiles,  and  the  circular  stone  staircase  was  encrusted 
an  inch  thick  with  the  dirt  of  many  centuries,  and, 
where  not  so  preserved ,  the  steps  were  worn  away. 


280 


REMINISCENCES. 


Having  long  been  acquainted  with  Pugln's  "  Nor- 
mandy," I  quickly  went  the  round  of  the  originals. 
The  interior  of  St.  Etienne,  or  the  Ahhaye  aux 
hommes,  a  church  of  cathedral  dimensions,  is  much 
lighter  than  that  of  our  own  Norman  churches  of 
even  a  later  date.  Upon  an  immense  slab  in  the 
choir  is  deep  engraved,  Guillaume  le  Conque- 
KANT.  Our  dear  friends  the  Huguenots,  nay  our 
revered  ancestors  many  of  us  may  say,  did  their  best 
to  scatter  the  bones  of  the  giant ;  though  the  Revolu- 
tionists seem  to  have  found  something  left  to  wreak 
their  fury  on.  St.  Pierre,  with  its  wonderful  per- 
forated spire,  is  placed  so  low  and  is  so  beset  with 
nuisances,  that  we  might  pass  it  with  little  notice. 
But  it  shows  afar.  Some  of  the"  churches  are  lamen- 
table ruins.  The  older  St.  Etienne,  I  think  the  one 
with  a  large  relief  of  the  Conqueror  on  horseback,  is 
a  store  for  firewood  and  for  rags. 

The  picturesque  tower  of  St.  Nicholas  has  been 
gutted  for  a  shot  tower,  and  it  has  been  found  even 
necessary  to  cut  away  about  a  quarter  of  the  spiral 
staircase  the  whole  height.  At  every  round  you  have 
to  stride  over  a  yawning  abyss,  and  receive  at  the 
same  time  a  shower  of  molten  metal  on  your  hat  and 
clothes.  It  is  one  of  the  things  one  does  on  faith  ; 
you  are  told  to  do  it,  and  you  see  somebody  else  doing 
it ;  then  you  do  it  yourself,  and  think  no  more  about 
it.  The  shower  is  not  to  be  compared  to  a  discharge 
of  confetti,  or  even  to  an  ordinary  hailstorm. 

Of  the  original  church,  now  called  the  Ahhaye 
aux  dames,  founded  by  IMatilda,  the  great  mother  of 
a  thousand  kings,  there  remain  extensive  ruins,  and  a 
portion  kept  up  for  the  Nuns,  or  Sisters  of  Charity, 
and  the  patients  of  the  Hdtel-JDieu.    The  nunnery 


CAEN. 


281 


is  said  to  have  been  restricted  to  tlie  noblesse.  The 
present  buildings  date  from  early  last  century,  and 
are  magnificent.  They  make  a  hospital  far  surpassing 
anything  I  had  seen  before,  though  I  knew  well  the 
infirmaries  of  Derby,  Northampton,  and  Salisbury, 
each  said  to  have  singular  claims.  The  wards  were 
spacious  and  lofty  ;  every  bed  had  its  little  table,  its 
books  and  its  ornaments  ;  with  a  sacred  picture  or 
image  over  head,  and  whatever  one  may  expect  in 
a  well-appointed  bedroom.  The  Sisters  of  Charity 
were  moving  about  gently  and  silently.  I  had  nut 
seen  anything  to  compare  with  the  culinary  arrange- 
ments. Walking  into  the  country  I  soon  came  on  a 
vast  mass  of  ruins,  apparently  fresh  from  the  hands 
of  the  mason  and  the  sculptor.  It  was  a  religious 
house,  interrupted  and  then  destroyed  at  the  great 
Revolution. 

Everything  here  indicated  that  we  were  in  France, 
and  in  the  Normandy  of  history  and  of  travel.  The 
men  wore  blouses,  the  vehicles  were  rude  and  anti- 
quated ;  the  little  children  called  out  Le  petit  coehon  ! 
at  the  child  with  us,  and  threw  stones  at  us  on  the 
sly.  Handsome  women,  old  and  young,  were  walking 
about  with  magnificent  fabrics  of,  lace  towering  over 
their  heads  half  a  yard  or  more,  with  lace  streamers 
descending  below  their  shoulders.  One  of  these  girls 
was  attracting  the  attention  of  the  whole  town  by  her 
stature,  her  beauty,  and  her  stately  bearing.  They 
were  coming  out,  and  this  was  their  introduction 
to  such  society  as  was  open  to  them.  They  were 
peasant  proprietors,  with  some  land  and  plenty  of 
money.  We  were  told  the  framework  of  their  tall 
caps  was  sometimes  several  centuries  old,  and  that 
the  lace  itself  might  sometimes  be  two  centuries ; 


282 


REMINISCENCES. 


indeed,  that  some  of  these  caps  were  worth  several 
hundred  pounds  apiece.  Of  course  the  wearers  had 
chaperons,  who  seemed  proud  of  their  charges,  and 
with  their  eyes  well  about  them. 

The  Duke  and  Duchess  de  Nemours  had  come  to 
spend  the  race  week  at  Caen.  The  Orleanists  there 
were  said  to  be  between  two  fires,  the  Legitimists  and 
the  Republicans,  and  they  wanted  encouragement. 
There  were  two  grand  functions  at  the  Cathedral,  and 
the  Duke  and  Duchess  appeared  in  state.  The  occa- 
sion of  the  first  I  forget,  but  it  was  ill  attended,  and 
this  1  was  told  was  an  intended  slight. 

The  next  occasion  was  the  first  anniversary  of  the 
death  of  the  Duke  of  Orleans,  and  the  solemn  mass 
for  the  repose  of  his  soul.  It  appeai'ed  to  me  that 
besides  the  military,  all  Caen  was  there,  the  greater 
part  in  robes  of  office,  order,  or  guild.  Talk  of  the 
trappings  of  monai'chy  !  I  have  seldom  seen  such 
a  display  of  robes  as  at  the  funeral  of  a  hospital 
physician  at  Paris  three  years  ago.  The  most  im- 
posing feature  of  the  ceremony  at  Caen  was  a  semi- 
circle of  sappers,  big  fellows,  with  tall  fur  caps,  black 
beards,  white  aprons,  and  burnished  axes,  behind  the 
altar.  In  the  open^gpace  before  the  altar  were  the 
Duke  and  Duchess  on  their  knees,  the  former  just  a 
foot  or  two  from  the  slab  of  the  Conqueror.  With 
a  very  small  coin  I  induced  a  cotintrywoman  to  sell 
me  her  gripe  on  the  railing  round  the  choir,  and  then, 
mounted  two  or  three  steps,  I  could  survey  the  whole 
scene.  At  the  usual  time  in  the  service,  for  I  was 
now  beginning  to  be  familiar  with  it,  a  priest  so  I 
supjjosed  him  to  be,  came  round  with  a  plate,  collect- 
ing alms  pour  le  mort ;  that  is,  so  I  interpreted  it,  for 
the  repose  of  the  Duke  of  Orleans'  soul.   He  held  his 


CAEN. 


283 


plate  resolutely  to  the  Duke  de  Nemours  for  not  less 
than  a  minute,  the  Duke  remaining  immovable.  At 
last  an  equerry,  I  suppose  it  was,  advanced  from  the 
circle  and  said  a  word  to  the  priest,  who  withdrew. 
Several  times  we  met  the  Duke  and  Duchess  driving 
through  the  streets.  No  hats  were  taken  off,  as  I  was 
told  they  would  have  been  to  any  princes  of  the  older 
house. 

Mr.  Evans,  the  Pusey  clergyman,  -who  had  invited 
us  to  call  on  him,  was  very  hospitable  and  very 
serviceable  to  us,  and  through  him  we  made  acquaint- 
ances who  called  and  left  their  cards  at  the  glazier's 
shop  for  us.  Of  Dr.  Webber,  Dean  of  Ilipon,  and 
one  or  two  receptions  at  his  handsome  apartments, 
occasionally  occupied  by  the  first  Emperor  I  believe, 
in  the  new  town,  I  have  a  most  agreeable  remem- 
brance. 

I  cannot  remember  how  we  became  acquainted 
with  Mdlle.  Tyrrell,  The  moment  I  saw  her  and 
heard  her  name,  I  recognized  her  unmistakable  like- 
ness to  a  Miss  Tyrrell  I  knew  in  Salisbury  Plain, 
since  better  known  for  her  cottage  hospital  and  other 
good  deeds  at  Ilfracombe.  Figure,  eyes,  hair,  fea- 
tures, expression,  and  manner  all  the  same ;  the 
character  too.  Mademoiselle  told  us  these  were  the 
characteristics  of  the  whole  family.  They  had  all 
dark  brown  eyes,  and  they  were  all  blunt,  truthful, 
and  good.  She  was  very  kind,  and  would  do  any- 
thing for  us,  occasionally  putting  my  courage  to  the 
proof  and  my  shyness  to  confusion. 

She  must  take  us  over  Le  Bon  Sauveur.  It  was  a 
grand  establishment,  covering  a  large  area,  but  with 
irregular  and  homely  buildings,  in  which  Nuns  or 
Sisters  took  charge  of  schools,  orphans,  deaf  and 


284 


REMINISCENCES. 


dumb,  idiots,  sick  people,  and  it  seemed  to  me,  all 
that  wanted  help.  For  these  multifarious  purposes 
there  were  four  sources  of  support,  —  the  city,  the 
department,  the  state,  and  charitable  people.  We 
were  in  the  heart  of  this  universal  I'efage  when  it  was 
explained  to  the  Nuns  that  I  was  a  priest,  and  that 
the  lady  with  me  was  my  wife.  They  shrugged  their 
shoulders,  exclaimed  3Ion  Dieu  !  uplifted  their  hands 
and  exchanged  glances  one  with  another.  Our  visit 
proved  unwelcome  and  fruitless,  and  I  was  a  little 
put  out  with  my  well-intentioned  guide. 

Mdlle.  Tj'rrell  it  proved  was  really  a  cousin  of  our 
English  ]\Iiss  Tyrrell,  but  in  a  very  remote  degree. 
Tyrrell,  whose  glancing  arrow  killed  Rufus,  fled  to 
Normandy,  and  was  never  allowed  to  return.  His 
eldest  son  had  to  share  his  banishment.  The  second 
son,  having  no  pretence  to  the  inheritance,  was  al- 
lowed to  settle  in  England.  Mademoiselle  was  de- 
scended from  the  older  son,  Miss  from  the  younger. 
Unless,  what  is  not  unlikely,  there  were  intermar- 
riages, the  ladies  were  only  related  in  the  twenty- 
fourth  degree  of  consanguinity.  That  they  should 
have  a  strong  family  resemblance  will  not  surprise 
any  student  of  genealogies. 

In  the  cornfields,  all  about  the  upper  town  of  Caen, 
we  saw  immense  wheels,  of  a  very  light  construc- 
tion, rising  twenty  feet  above  the  ground.  These  are 
called  cerdes  cTHercule.  Every  now  and  then,  half 
a  dozen  men  clamber  up  the  circumference  and  set 
the  wheel  revolving.  In  this  simple  way  blocks  of 
stone,  each  weighing  as  much  as  seven  or  eight  tons, 
are  drawn  along  the  galleries  of  the  quarries  seventy 
feet  below  the  surface,  and  up  the  shafts. 

Our  good  friend  Mr.  Evans  asked  us  to  partake  of 


CAEN. 


285 


a  great  treat  his  children  were  looking  forward  to.  I 
think  we  became  as  absorbed  in  the  prospect  as  his 
children  were.  He  had  received  from  home  a  real 
English  ham.  A  ham  with  peas  and  boiled  potatoes 
was  a  banquet  for  the  Olympian  deities.  Perhaps  one 
of  our  party  would  have  thought  the  menu  improved 
with  bitter  ale  ;  but  nothing  could  be  better  than  the 
vin  ordinaire,  straight  from  Bordeaux,  in  the  tun,  and 
bottled  by  Mr.  Evans  himself,  costing  him  only  two- 
pence or  threepence  the  bottle. 

We  wished  to  go  to  Bayeux  to  see  the  Cathedral 
and  the  Tapestry,  but,  as  our  resources  were  limited, 
I  dreaded  any  enlargement  of  our  plans.  Mr.  Evans 
told  us  how  to  do  it  easily  and  cheaply.  Early  in 
the  morning  he  took  us  to  a  cab-stand  where  he  was 
known,  and  made  an  agreement  with  the  driver  of  a 
very  rough  hooded  vehicle,  with  horse  to  match,  tliat 
I  was  to  have  the  use  of  it  a  whole  day  for  ten  francs. 
Dismissing  the  driver,  who  seemed  right  glad  of  a 
holiday,  I  mounted  and  drove  to  Bayeux,  seventeen 
miles  off.  The  country  assumed  an  English  charac- 
ter, good  farm  buildings,  large  green  fields,  fine  cattle, 
and  hedgerows.  At  Bayeux  we  had  been  told  to  ex- 
pect an  English-looking  population,  for  it  was  a  Saxon 
tribe  the  Normans  had  made  terms  with.  The  peo- 
ple I  thought  handsome,  solid  and  well  built,  but  not 
pei'ceptibly  Saxon.  The  interior  of  the  cathedral  is 
beautiful ;  all  diaper  work,  as  in  Westminster  Abbey. 
It  was  a  reminder  of  my  poor  unfinished  church  at 
Cholderton,  for  it  was  evident  the  nave  had  been 
built  to  half  its  height,  and  then  left  to  the  elements 
for  a  century.  The  tapestry,  in  a  large  room  built 
for  the  purpose,  we  examined  very  closely.  It  is 
a  wonderful  combination  of  simplicity  and  vigor  ; 


286 


REMINISCENCES. 


all  alive  with  great  ideas  struggling  for  expression 
through  a  very  rude  medium.  I  held  up  the  child  to 
see  the  work  closely.  As  its  wont  was  when  held  up 
in  that  fashion,  it  kicked  a  foot  through  one  of  the 
panes  of  glass.  There 's  my  cheap  journey  to  Bay- 
eux !  I  said  to  myself,  thinking  the  damage  would  be 
twenty  francs  or  more.  The  custodian,  a  remarkably 
fine  specimen  of  the  Norman  womankind,  went  off,  at 
our  request,  to  a  glazier.  He  came,  looking  very 
grave.  Carefully  measuring  the  broken  pane,  which 
was  not  less  than  twenty  inches  square,  he  said  the 
new  pane  would  be  two  francs,  and  the  cost  of  put- 
ting it  in  half  a  franc,  altogether  two  and  a  penny  of 
our  money.  I  drew  breath  again,  and  have  ever  since 
believed  Bayeux  the  most  simple  and  honest  city  in 
the  civilized  world.  A  few  years  after  I  had  occasion 
to  consider  the  glass  duties,  and  my  principle  through 
that  question  was  that  England  should  be  made  as 
like  as  possible  to  Bayeux. 

It  was  quite  dark  before  we  got  back  to  Caen.  At 
the  entrance  of  the  town  the  usual  officer  of  the  octroi 
stopped  us,  and  presented  himself  at  the  side  with  a 
lamp,  and  something  vei-y  like  a  long  sword.  "  Any 
wine,  or  fruit?  "  he  asked,  and  was  proceeding,  so  it 
seemed,  to  run  his  sword  through  a  bundle  lying  on 
the  seat.  Happily  he  was  stopped  in  time,  for  it  was 
the  child. 


CHAPTER  CXIII. 

LAJSTGRUNE. 

Caen  has  a  great  secret,  which  it  keeps  to  itself,  at 
least  from  foreigners.  It  is  Langrnne.  I  cannot  find 
it  in  any  map  or  handbook.  I  never  heard  of  it  be- 
fore I  went  to  Caen,  and  I  have  never  heard  of  it 
since.  It  is  one  of  a  long  string  of  villages  lining  the 
coast  of  Calvados  ;  the  one  nearest  to  Caen.  The 
coast  is  ironbonnd,  as  they  say.  Nothing  bigger  than 
a  small  boat  can  approach  it.  For  thirty  miles  of 
coast  the  Caen  stone  stretches  into  the  sea,  forming 
a  rocky  bottom  for  at  least  four  miles  from  the  shore. 
A  line  of  lofty  perforated  church  spires  warns  strange 
vessels  off  the  shore.  The  coast  people  are  primitive 
and  religious.  Mdlle.  Tyrrell  and  Mr.  Evans  agreed 
that  we  must  not  leave  Caen  without  a  week  or  more 
at  Langrune.  The  clergy  and  the  old  noblesse  went 
there  to  be  out  of  the  way.  People  lived  quietly  and 
sociably  at  Langrune. 

So  we  went  thei'e  in  a  crowded  omnibus.  The 
springs  were  light,  and  every  now  and  then  the  body 
of  the  vehicle  came  down  with  a  frightful  bump  on 
the  solid  axletrees.  Half  a  mile  out  of  the  town  the 
driver  alighted,  took  two  blocks  of  wood,  evidently 
prepared  for  the  emergency,  forced  them  into  the 
springs,  and  stopped  their  play  altogether.  Under 
these  circumstances  I  had  a  distant  and  not  very  com- 
fortable view  of  Chlteau  le  Henri,  largely  imitated  in 


288 


REMINISCENCES. 


modeini  English  mansions.  At  length  we  found  our- 
selves on  a  low  seashore,  no  scenery,  no  shipping,  not 
much  in  the  way  of  buildings,  no  hotel,  no  bathing- 
machines,  or  other  outward  signs  of  a  watering-place. 

We  found  shelter  with  another  Madame  Marie, 
patronized  by  the  English  clergy.  One  of  them,  a 
chaplain,  she  would  be  always  talking  about.  He 
would  drop  in  late  from  Caen,  knock  at  the  door,  and 
throw  lumps  of  earth  at  her  window  :  "  You  bite, 
why  don't  you  come  down  ?  Why  don't  you  open 
the  door,  you  hete  ?  "  You  may  call  a  Frenchwoman 
a  lete  a  hundred  times,  but  not  stujnde  once.  That 's 
an  eternal  sepai'ation. 

Mdlle.  Tyrrell  had  secured  for  us  the  earliest  atten- 
tion of  two  priests,  who  with  their  sister,  a  young  lady 
in  some  employment  at  Caen,  were  taking  their  holi- 
day at  Langrune.  There  were  many  clergy  there,  and 
some  apparently  studying  for  Orders,  but  these  two 
were  evidently  distinguished  among  them,  and  were 
of  a  higher  type.  M.  Achille  Valroger  had  large, 
dark,  flashing  eyes,  fine  features,  a  mouth  combining 
sweetness  and  power,  and  a  good  figure  as  well. 
His  brother  Hyacinthe  had  a  strong  family  likeness, 
but  his  expression  was  more  that  of  tenderness  and 
of  mild  humor,  and  he  was  a  lame,  misshapen  dwarf.. 

They  were  most  agreeable  talkers,  and  they  re- 
minded me  of  my  old  Oxford  friends,  in  spite  of  the 
difficulty  of  communication.  For  our  sake  they  la- 
bored to  express  every  syllable  slowly  and  distinctly, 
and  generally  succeeded.  They  had  heard  much  of 
what  was  going  on  in  England  and  at  Oxford,  and 
they  were  familiar  with  the  names  of  Newman  and 
Pusey  ;  indeed  they  knew  some  bits  of  their  writings 
better  than  I  did.    They  took  it  for  granted  that 


LANGEUNE. 


289 


Newman  would  join  their  communion,  and  that  he 
was  only  lingering  in  order  to  bring  more  with  him 
in  the  end.  This  they  seemed  to  think  a  natural  and 
proper  proceeding,  and  I  should  doubt  whether  there 
exists  a  Frenchman  capable  of  thinking  otherwise. 

It  may  seem  unwarrantable  to  attribute  to  a  great 
and  gallant  nation  a  moral  code  which  few  English- 
men would  be  found  to  tolerate ;  but  France  is  a  mil- 
itary nation,  and  has  also  ever  been  divided  into  par- 
ties practically  at  war,  and  observing  the  old  maxim 
that  all  is  fair  in  love  and  in  war.  We  Englishmen 
hardly  know  what  a  great  blessing  we  enjoy  in  being 
able  upon  the  whole  to  observe  the  code  of  honor, 
even  while  we  disagree. 

How  the  Valrogers  came  to  know  the  lady  was 
Newman's  sister  I  cannot  remember.  My  case  was 
plain  in  their  eyes.  It  was  that  of  the  young  Augus- 
tine, and  through  a  course  of  St.  Augustine,  chapter 
and  verse,  they  proceeded  to  take  me.  I  walked  with 
them  every  day,  and,  strange  to  say,  talked.  My 
readers  will  ask  in  what  language.  Though  I  wrote 
a  good  French  letter  the  year  of  the  battle  of  Wa- 
terloo, I  have  never  been  able  to  talk  in  French.  I 
have  never  even  attempted.  On  the  other  hand  my 
clerical  friends  could  not  talk  or  understand  a  word  of 
English.  There  was  nothing  else  to  be  done.  I 
talked  Latin.  Nobody  knows  what  he  can  do  till  he 
tries.  Every  time  it  was  my  "  neck  verse  ;  "  I  must 
reply,  and  make  myself  understood.  My  Latin  was 
certainly  neither  colloquial,  nor  theological,  nor  phil- 
osophical. Newman  used  to  tell  me  it  was  hardly 
prose  at  all,  but  made  up  of  scraps  of  Virgil  and 
Ovid.    However,  I  was  understood. 

My  friends  were  very  much  interested  in  Oxford, 

VOL.  n.  19 


290 


REMINISCENCES. 


which  was  evidently  something  quite  beyond  their 
conceptions.  Of  the  theological  course  pursued  there 
I  could  give  no  account.  As  they  answered  my  ques- 
tions by  rule,  they  expected  me  to  do  the  same.  They 
would  tell  me  their  own  system,  why  could  not  I  tell 
them  ours?  On  one  point  I  had  the  advantage.  My 
little  Oxford  Greek  Testament  must  have  been  lying 
about,  for  they  were  told  I  could  read  the  original 
into  English.  They  could  hardly  believe  it  possible, 
unless  I  were  a  most  accomplished  scholar  whose  fame 
would  go  before  him.  But  they  evidently  thought  it 
a  superfluous  accomplishment.  The  cumulated  strain 
upon  me  I  found  considerable,  especially  as  there 
were  two  of  them,  and  when  one  ceased  the  other  be- 
gan. But  happily  they  could  change  the  subject,  and 
be  very  amusing. 

Subsequent  reflection  satisfied  me  that  besides  mis- 
takes of  a  more  palpable  character,  the  use  of  Latin 
had  one  general  ill  tendency.  It  is  the  language  of 
grand  sentiments  and  big  things.  I  was  in  the  case 
of  a  common  shopkeeper,  not  a  bit  better  than  his 
neighbors,  talking  Bible.  The  medium  itself  involved 
hypocrisy  and  a  baseless  assumption.  This  was  our 
first  visit  to  a  foreign  soil,  and  we  did  not  appear  to 
be  in  want  of  means  in  comparison  with  ordinary 
Frenchmen.  So  our  friends  asked  why  wo  had  not 
gone  to  Paris,  instead  of  wasting  our  time  at  Caen 
and  Langrune.  No  Frenchman  would  hesitate  for  a 
moment  where  to  go.  He,  or  she,  would  rather  be  at 
Paris,  with  a  bloody  Revolution  imaging  all  round,  than 
enjoying  peace  and  safety  in  the  provinces.  So  the 
question  was  natural. 

The  answer  I  gave  fills  me  with  shame  as  I  write 
it,  but  yet  was  not  wholly  unreal.    I  said  I  did  not 


LANGRUNE. 


291 


care  to  go  to  a  city  which  had  been  the  scene  of  such 
terrible  events.  I  wished  to  see  France,  not  Paris ; 
France  as  she  used  to  be.  This  was  a  sentiment 
above  the  scale  of  my  friends,  and  they  looked  on  me 
as  a  sublime  character  indeed,  and  a  great  prize,  if 
the)'  could  secure  me.  As  a  fact,  the  horrors  of  the 
great  Revolution  were  fresh  in  my  boyhood.  I  had 
also  felt  extreme  indignation  at  the  then  recent  tri- 
umph of  the  long  Orleanist  intrigues.  So  I  was  more 
than  satisfied  to  take  our  holiday  at  Caen,  of  which 
my  architectural  books  had  told  me  so  much.  Several 
of  my  Oxford  friends  had  taken  £20  or  £S0  in  their 
pockets,  and  spent  a  month  pleasantly  in  Normandy 
and  Brittany.  Yet,  as  I  think  over  the  matter,  I  am 
sure  that  with  a  hundred  pounds  to  do  what  I  liked 
with,  I  should  have  preferred  a  visit  to  the  city  of 
Revolutions,  even  if  one  Revolution  more  was  raging 
there,  —  perhaps  the  more  for  that. 

The  Valrogers  invited  me  one  day  to  walk  with 
them  to  call  on  an  abbd,  a  great  man,  who  was  to  bo 
a  dignitary,  perhaps  a  bishop,  some  day.  They  were 
disposed  to  quiz  him,  and,  as  we  walked  on,  they 
dwelt  on  the  very  respectful  demeanor  we  should  all 
have  to  observe,  and  the  attention  we  should  have 
to  pay  to  the  great  man's  utterances.  It  was  plain 
they  did  not  like  him  much.  I  suspect  he  was  an 
Orleanist,  or  a  trimmer.  We  arrived  at  a  good  house, 
in  a  large  walled  garden,  with  broad  green  walks  and 
rows  of  trees  and  shrubs.  The  great  man  was  not  at 
home.  Well,  we  might  as  well  take  a  turn  in  the 
garden. 

As  we  walked  on,  the  brothers  seemed  to  be  en- 
gaged in  some  topic  of  their  own.  We  came  to  a 
fine  mulberry  tree,  under  which  lay  a  great  quantity 


292 


REMINISCENCES. 


of  ripe  fruit.  I  stooped  down  to  pick  up  some  of  it. 
While  I  was  so  engaged  my  friends  had  turned  a 
corner  and  were  out  of  sight,  and  the  great  man  him- 
self had  suddenly  appeared  on  the  scene.  He  looked 
at  me  graciously  but  inquiringly ;  and  he  certainly 
had  a  right  to  know  how  a  stranger  came  to  be  in 
his  garden  eating  his  mulberries.  So  out  with  ray 
Latin.  "Veni  hue  cum  amicis  quibusdam  tuis,  qui 
cum  te  domi  non  inveniebant,  volebant  monstrare 
mihi  hortum  tuum.  Illi  progressi  sunt.  Ego  resta- 
bam  hie  breviter  ut  fruges  tuas  consumerem  —  ut 
vides."  G.  A.  D.  will  blush  for  his  country  at  the 
thought  of  such  Latinity  being  exhibited  even  to  a 
French  abbe,  but  I  should  like  to  see  him  in  the  same 
situation.  The  great  man  accepted  the  explanation 
courteously,  if  not  intelligently,  and,  walking  on  with 
me,  soon  overtook  the  brothers.  The  fact  was,  on 
coming  home  he  had  been  informed  that  they,  with 
a  friend,  had  gone  into  the  garden,  and  he  had  fol- 
lowed them. 

My  Latin  I  remember  did  not  always  avail  me.  I 
went  into  Caen  for  letters,  and  took  the  opportunity 
to  get  some  bottles  of  ale.  But  what  was  I  to  get 
them  into?  What  is  French  for  a  small  hamper?  I 
tried  first  one  word,  then  another,  and  at  each  word 
the  good  woman  in  the  shop  produced  something 
quite  unsuitable.  She  called  in  all  her  neighbors, 
who  greatly  enjoyed  my  perplexity.  I  succeeded  at 
last  by  signs,  which  I  frequently  found  my  only  re- 
source. 

The  Valrogers  took  for  granted  that  I  was  consid- 
ering the  great  question,  and  they  daily  impressed 
upon  me  that  no  time  was  to  be  lost  in  the  answer. 
They  gave  us  souvenirs,  which  lie  before  me,  too 


LANGRUNE. 


293 


new,  too  little  used.  I  cannot  resist  enumerating 
them,  and  transcribing  tlie  inscriptions.  To  me  they 
gave,  "  M^thode  courte  et  facile  pour  se  convaincre 
de  la  v^rit^  de  la  Religion  Catholique,"  selected  from 
the  writings  of  Bossuet,  Fenelon,  Pascal,  and  Bullet. 
The  inscription  is  "  a  M.  Mozley,  gage  d'affectueus 
devoument.  H.  de  Valroger,  chanoine  honoraire  de 
Bayeux,  et  professeur  de  philosophie  au  S^minaire  de 
Sommervieu  pres  Bayeux  (Calvados).  Occurramus 
omnes  in  unitatem  fidei,  Ephes  4."  Under  this  is 
written  in  another  hand,  "A.  de  Valroger,  professeur 
de  theologie  au  Sdminaire  de  Nantes."  From  an  in- 
scription in  "Oraisons  Funebres  de  Bossuet,"  given 
to  my  wife,  I  gather  that  Achille  de  Valroger  had  the 
title  of  Abb^.  The  sister  gave  my  wife  "  La  Journde 
du  Chrdtien,"  compiled  by  M.  I'Abbe  Diipanloup 
from  Bossuet.  It  is  neatly  inscribed  in  her  hand, 
"a  Madame  Mozley,  gage  d'affectlon  respectueuse  et 
ddvoude.    Adele  de  Valroger." 

The  Valrogers  wished  to  hear  news  from  me,  de- 
cisive or  at  least  favorable.  The  length  of  time  that 
has  elapsed  forbids  a  hope  that  those  two  men  still 
live  to  this  world,  or  that  if  living  they  are  still  the 
bright  figures  they  then  were.  But  they  dwell  un- 
changed in  my  memory,  and  I  fondly  trust  will  never 
die  there,  whatever  else  in  the  way  of  communion 
may  be  the  order  and  will  of  the  Almighty. 

We  were,  I  think,  two  Sundays  at  Langrune.  I 
attended  the  services  in  the  parish  church,  joining  in 
them  witli  certain  reserves.  The  church  was  crowded 
with  men  in  blouses.  In  the  adjoining  parish  the 
fishermen  had  subscribed  amongst  themselves  enough 
to  build  a  handsome  and  capacious  church.  The 
people  who  say  that  Frenchmen  never  go  to  church 
must  confine  their  observations  to  the  great  towns. 


294 


BEirmiSCENCES. 


At  one  morning  service,  suddenly  everybody  was 
seated,  and  there  was  a  deep  silence.  A  figure  rose 
up  in  the  midst,  upright,  with  marked  features,  and  in 
a  splendid  vestment,  the  name  of  which  many  of  my 
readers  will  know  better  than  I  do.  He  sang  a  song 
to  the  Blessed  Virgin  with  the  brilliancy  and  fluency 
of  a  glorious  bird.  The  congregation  was  evidently 
enthralled  as  much  as  I  was.  In  the  afternoon,  as  I 
was  roaming  about  the  village,  I  heard  the  same  voice 
in  the  distance  and  followed  it.  A  crowd  of  men 
were  sitting  in  and  about  a  public  house,  and  my 
morning's  friend  was  singing  a  comic  song,  at  the 
close  of  which  he  was  greeted  with  loud  applause.  It 
a  little  impaired  the  morning's  illusion,  and  I  did  not 
wait  to  hear  more.  Yet  in  all  human  affairs,  in  all 
religions  and  classes,  among  the  very  best  people, 
there  must  and  will  be  compromises. 

On  a  day  of  unusual  brilliancy,  as  we  poured  out 
of  the  church,  I  noticed  that  the  congregation,  in- 
stead of  parting  into  different  directions,  moved  in 
one  unbroken  column,  man,  woman,  child,  rich  and 
poor,  toward  the  sea-shore.  I  went  with  them,  ig- 
norant of  the  reason.  To  my  amazement  the  sea  had 
disappeared,  and  in  its  place  was  a  pavement  of  rock 
stretching  a  mile  from  the  shore,  and  right  and  left 
further  than  I  could  see.  Already  there  were  groups 
of  people,  and  even  carts  far  out.  The  congregation 
immediately  spread  itself  over  tliis  new  world.  It 
was  intersected  everywhere  by  channels  and  lakelets, 
full  of  sea  life,  in  forms  then  quite  new  to  me.  The 
water  was  so  still  and  so  clear  that  but  for  the  crea- 
tures movinof  about  one  could  hardlv  see  there  was 
any  water  at  all.  People  with  baskets  were  collect- 
ing whatever  might  be  worth  the  trouble.    I  walked 


LANGRUNE. 


295 


on  and  on,  sometimes  stepping  deep  in  the  still  and 
colorless  pools,  till  it  occurred  to  me  to  turn  round. 
I  could  no  longer  distinguish  Langrune  from  half 
a  dozen  other  villages,  which  had  all  poured  out 
their  populations  into  the  deserted  sea-bed.  Lan- 
grune, however,  had  a  fine  perforated  church  spire ; 
the  new  church  I  have  mentioned  had  not  one  to  show 
much.  So  I  found  my  way  back,  with  a  handlierchief 
full  of  curious  starfish,  sea-urchins,  sea-anemones, 
small  polypuses,  and  other  creatures.  On  getting 
home  I  put  them  all  into  sea  water,  but  they  soon 
languished  and  died. 

The  system  of  bathing  at  I;angrune  was  simple 
enough.  The  bathers  dressed  for  the  sea  in  their 
own  houses,  and  walked  half  a  mile,  it  might  be,  be- 
fore they  reached  the  shore.  There  they  found 
acquaintances  with  whom  they  walked  into  the 
water,  frolicked  and  danced  for  a  time,  and  then 
they  returned  home  dripping  like  Newfoundland 
dogs  all  the  way.  By  this  time  tlieir  feet  were  cold 
and  covered  with  mud  or  dust.  But  they  were  sure 
to  find  foot-pans  of  hot  water  ready  for  them,  both 
for  cleanliness,  and  to  secure  a  wholesome  reaction. 

One  of  the  roads  from  Langrune  to  Caen  passed 
by  La  Deltverande,  a  famous  centime  of  pilgrimages. 
If  I  remember  rightly,  the  object  of  special  venera- 
tion was  a  miraculous  image  of  the  Blessed  Virerin 
that  had  survived  various  casualties.  The  chapel  was 
always  open.  Pilgrims  were  always  arriving,  some 
in  long  procession  from  a  distance.  They  were  of 
all  ages,  with  one  or  more  priests  at  tlieir  head.  One 
of  these  processions  I  saw  at  Caen  on  its  return. 
The  day  was  very  hot  and  the  general  fatigue  was 
great,  but  they  seemed  to  bear  it  easily.    Once  or 


296 


REMINISCENCES. 


twice  I  found  the  priests  looked  at  us  rather  fiercely, 
presuming  us  to  be  unsympathetic  spectators.  But 
they  had  been  walking  many  miles  in  a  hot  sun,  a 
dusty  road,  and  in  a  crowd.  The  instincts  of  pil- 
grimage and  of  processions  are  strong,  and  will 
develop  themselves  in  one  form  or  another.  The 
Americans  are  eminently  given  to  processions,  to 
anniversaries,  to  celebrations  linked  with  places  and 
epochs.  Yet  they  are  beyond  a  doubt  a  sensible 
nation. 


CHAPTER  CXIV. 


CHATEAU  d'OUTEELAISE. 

The  Valrogers  had  early  introduced  us  to  a  Count 
and  Countess  de  Polignac,  and  their  rehitive  the 
Countess  de  Ste.  Aldegonde.  He  was  first  cousin,  so 
I  understood,  of  the  minister  whose  eloquent  but  vain 
protest  on  the  eve  of  the  July  Revolution  had  so 
much  moved  me.  There  was  also  a  charming  little 
fellow,  who  might  now  be  the  head  of  the  family. 
They  seemed  to  be  doing  it  as  cheaply  and  quietly  as 
anybody  there,  walking  through  the  village  in  their 
bathing  costume,  ducking  and  splashing,  and  dancing 
in  circles,  like  the  rest,  going  home  like  drowned 
rats,  and  shortly  returning  to  the  sands  to  walk  and 
talk. 

The  Valrogers  had  told  them  all  about  us,  and 
they  no  doubt  desired  our  conversion,  which  they 
understood  to  be  in  progress,  but  perhaps  they  even 
more  desired  to  impart  to  us  their  intense  hatred  of 
Louis  Philippe.  It  was  not  pleasant  to  us  to  hear  a 
reigning  sovereign  spoken  of  as  they  spoke  of  him, 
especially  as  our  Queen  was  about  to  pay  him  a  visit, 
which  he  was  to  return.  "Would  that  he  might 
never  get  back  again  !  "  they  said,  for,  going  and  re- 
turning, there  were  two  chances  of  his  going  to  the 
bottom.  They  hated  England  also,  but  liked  the 
English  individually.  They  had  a  skit  at  our  Quoen 
which  of  course  applied  not  only  to   the  whole 


298 


REMnflSCENCES. 


dynasty,  from  tlie  Conqueror  downwards,  but  to  the 
old  French  and  most  other  European  dynasties: 
"She 's  descended  from  one  of  our  country  girls." 

The  ladies  talked  English  well,  and  knew  many 
English  people,  whom  they  expected  us  also  to  know, 
not  perceiving  the  difference  between  London  and 
Salisbury  Plain.  They  had  a  great  curiosity  to 
know  more  about  England,  which  seemed  to  have  pre- 
sented itself  to  them  in  quite  a  new  light  now  that  it 
was  the  field  of  a  religious  movement  in  the  direction 
of  Rome.  Movements  usually  meant  destruction  in 
their  eyes,  but  this  was  for  union  and  for  order,  that 
is  for  the  proper  subordination  of  classes  and  recog- 
nition of  authorities.  But  could  any  good  thing 
come  out  of  England?  In  the  emergency  which 
they  contemplated,  they  invited  us  to  take  refuge  in 
France.  So  many  people  would  be  glad  to  make  our 
acquaintance.  They  found  that  I  was  myself  bound 
to  return  soon,  for  I  had  appointed  to  be  home  by 
September  for  the  work  of  the  "  British  Critic." 
Was  my  wife  obliged  to  return  with  me  ?  I  had 
already  pressed  her  to  remain  a  month  longer  in 
Normandy.  So  she  gladly  accepted  an  invitation 
to  Chateau  d'Outrelaise,  par  Langannerie,  Calvados. 

Three  weeks  after  my  return  home,  she  went  there 
with  the  child  and  the  maid,  and  was  very  pleasantly 
entertained  for  a  fortnight.  It  was  a  grand  liouse, 
with  lofty  roofs,  tall  chimneystacks,  a  courtyard,  a 
fine  gateway,  and  handsome  suites  of  rooms.  The 
Polignacs  were  the  old  family  of  the  place,  and  the 
style  was  that  of  our  own  straitened  and  old-fashioned 
gentry.  They  and  the  neighbors  dropped  in  one 
upon  another.  The  French  are  really  early  lasers, 
and  their  eleven  or  twelve  o'clock  breakfast  is  equiv- 


CHATEAU  D'OUTRELAISE. 


299 


alent  to  our  lunch.  Any  lady  might  choose  that  time 
for  a  call.  If  it  was  fine,  the  company  then  walked 
in  the  park,  or  looked  at  the  poultry.  I  suspect 
there  were  fighting  cocks  at  Outrelaise.  If  it  was 
wet  they  played  at  billiards  or  had  games.  It  was 
now  past  the  equinox,  and  the  evenings  were  chill. 
Once  or  twice  in  the  evening,  the  Countess  rose  and 
said,  "  Let 's  make  a  tour  d  la  roclie^'  and  then  they 
all  went  and  warmed  themselves  at  the  kitchen  fire, 
talking  with  the  old  servants. 

A  contested  election  for  the  mayoralty  of  the  vil- 
lage was  going  on,  and  the  family  was  indulging  in  a 
faint  hope  that  a  friend  might  be  elected.  On  the 
contrary  it  was  their  worst  enemy,  and  the  success- 
ful party  came  at  the  close  of  the  election,  which  was 
on  Sunday,  with  banners  and  music,  and  kept  hurrah- 
ing for  half  an  hour  at  the  gate  within  hearing  of  the 
chateau.  The  new  mayor  they  described  as  a  mon- 
ster of  depravity  and  low  cunning. 

My  wife  was  very  desirous  to  make  use  of  the  op- 
portunity to  acquire  the  best  idiom,  pronunciation,  and 
accent.  These  the  Polignacs  told  her  are  confined  to 
the  best  society,  and  could  not  be  communicated  to 
the  mass  of  the  French  people,  much  less  to  foreign- 
ers. As  for  the  people  of  Normand}^,  they  all  talked 
broad  ;  they  were  too  near  England.  "  But  the 
clergy?  Don't  they  talk  good  French,  and  pronounce 
it  properly?"  They  smiled  at  the  idea.  "  tlow 
should  they  speak  French  ?  sons  of  peasants  and  epi- 
ciers  ?  "  "Now  don't  the  Valrogers  talk  good  French 
and  speak  it  well  ?  "  "  Tliey  talk  the  language  cor- 
rectly, but  it  is  not  the  language  or  the  pronunciation 
of  the  salons.  Very  few  even  of  the  bishops  can  talk 
and  pronounce  as  they  should.    You  can  tell  them  to 


300 


REMINISCENCES. 


be  a  class  of  their  own."  As  they  illustrated  these 
criticisms  with  examples  of  the  right  phrase  and  the 
right  tone,  and  the  wrong  ones  to  be  naturally  ex- 
pected in  a  pai-ish  priest,  and  even  a  bishop,  it  seemed 
to  be  too  evident  that  the  fastidiousness  of  excessive 
civilization  had  created  a  bar  between  the  noblesse  and 
the  clergy  themselves,  now  that  the  latter  were  more 
than  ever  from  the  bourgeois  and  peasant  classes. 
An  unapproachable  excellence  was  its  own  down- 
fall. 

But  poverty  came  in  as  a  mitigation  of  pride.  The 
dinners  and  the  menage  were  as  simple  as  those  of  an 
English  parsonage.  These  good  people  relished  a  po- 
tage  that  here  would  have  been  put  out  for  the  dogs. 
The  ladies,  as  I  saw  at  Langrune,  dressed  as  simply 
as  shopkeepers,  though  with  a  little  more  taste.  They 
were  ready  to  discuss  freely  the  downfall  of  the  old 
French  noblesse  and  their  exclusion  from  the  political 
and  the  larger  social  circle.  Generally  speaking  it 
was  owing  to  their  poverty,  the  immense  burdens 
that  lay  upon  them,  the  complicated  state  of  the 
land,  the  clergy,  the  religious  houses,  the  poor  retain- 
ers and  dependents,  the  old  servants,  and  above  all 
the  younger  sons  to  be  provided  for,  in  the  first,  sec- 
ond, and  third  degree,  there  being  but  few  openings 
for  regular  enterprise. 

When  these  people  could  hardly  pay  their  way  in 
the  country,  in  the  heart  of  their  own  belongings, 
they  could  scarcely  hope  to  make  an  appearance  at 
Paris.  However,  they  had  to  make  great  efforts,  to 
borrow  money,  and  attempt  now  and  then  a  Parisian 
season.  But  here  was  the  great  pinch  of  all.  To 
bankers,  farmers  of  the  revenue,  and  successful  spec- 
ulators, Paris  was  in  season  all  the  year.    They  were 


CHATEAU  D'OUTRELAISE. 


301 


at  home  at  Paris.  The  country  noblesse  could  only 
afford  to  come  up  late  in  spring  or  early  in  summer. 
The  wasteful  wood  fires  of  a  roomy  and  windy  chS.- 
teau  were  ruinous  at  Paris.  A  good  fire  was  esti- 
mated to  cost  twenty  francs  a  day.  The  whole  scale 
of  expenditure  was  impossible  to  a  country  gentle- 
man. He  became  more  and  more  a  stranger  and  a 
foreigner  at  Paris,  and  meanwhile  the  object  of  in- 
creasing envy,  jealousy,  and  aversion.  Other  reasons 
I  know  can  be  given  for  the  lamentable  fate  of  the 
French  nobility,  involving  as  it  did  the  fall  of  the 
monarchy ;  but  it  was  the  social  question  that  these 
ladies  dwelt  upon. 

Some  years  ago  an  announcement  in  the  papers 
suggested  that  the  pretty  little  fellow  I  saw  with  his 
mother  at  Langrune  might  have  been  listening  to 
these  and  the  like  discussions  to  some  practical  pur- 
pose. M.  Polignac,  it  ran,  had  just  married  the 
daughter  of  a  fashionable  and  wealthy  modiste.  How 
I  wish  I  could  ever  be  sure  that  he  had  not  fulfilled 
the  common  saying  that  a  young  French  lad  is  an 
angel,  but  grows  up  into  something  else !  The  Polig- 
nacs  corresponded  with  my  wife,  I  think,  as  long  as 
she  lived.  Tlieir  letters  were  always  interesting  and 
amusing,  but  also  very  bitter.  They  lie  buried  in  ac- 
cumulation a  few  yards  from  me,  but  I  shall  never  see 
them.  For  what  remains  of  my  eyesight  and  of  my 
wits  has  other  work  to  do. 

It  was  the  last  week  of  September,  1843,  and  the 
first  of  October  that  my  wife  spent  at  the  Chateau 
d'Outrelaise.  In  a  few  days,  and  after  a  very  stormy 
passage,  I  met  her  again  at  Southampton,  and  brought 
her  home  to  Cholderton.  Everything  she  had  heard 
or  seen  abroad  had  fixed  her  more  where  she  stood ; 


302 


REMINISCENCES. 


and  I  also  by  that  time  had  come  to  the  conclusion 
to  leave  theological  questions  to  those  who  are  more 
capable  or  more  worthy  of  them,  and  to  confine  my- 
self practically  to  the  lines  of  the  Church  of  England, 
as  far  as  I  could  discern  them. 


CHAPTER  CXV. 

"BRITISH  CRITIC,"  NO.  LXVIH. 

I  LEFT  Langrune  on  the  last  day  of  August.  As 
we  steamed  down  the  Orne  the  tide  had  some  hours 
still  to  flow,  and  as  the  waters  expanded  we  met 
scores  of  little  canoes,  each  with  a  tiny  square  sail, 
and  a  single  occupant  steering  rather  than  propelling 
with  his  paddle.  Each  canoe  had  what  appeared  a 
dangerously  large  freight  of  sand.  It  looked  as  if  the 
smallest  wave  would  swamp  it,  and  the  men  kept  a 
sharp  look-out  on  our  little  steamer.  Their  practice 
is  to  drop  down  with  the  ebb,  and  to  allow  themselves 
to  take  the  ground  all  over  the  sandbanks  at  the 
mouth  of  the  Orne.  The  receding  waters  leave  them 
high  and  dry.  They  then  with  their  paddles  scrape 
together  all  the  sand  within  reach,  fill  their  canoes, 
and  quietly  await  the  returning  tide  which  floats  them 
back  to  Caen.  Nothing  is  more  remarkable  in  indus- 
try than  its  many  singular  specialities.  Passing  along 
the  quay  at  Havre  to  my  packet  I  saw  a  regiment 
embarking  in  two  small  steamers  for  the  Ch§,teau 
d'Eu,  where  Louis  Phillipe  was  expecting  Queen  Vic- 
toria, on  a  short  visit  to  the  soil  of  France.  The 
spectacle  was  new  and  strange  to  me,  the  soldiers 
having  to  pass  rapidly  along  the  plank,  heavily  ac- 
coutred as  they  were,  and  form  themselves  into  coils 
all  over  the  deck,  where  there  could  be  barely  stand- 
ing room. 


304 


REMINISCENCES. 


On  the  first  of  September  I  was  again  in  Salisbury 
Plain.    Before  my  eyes,  in  more  senses  than  one  — 
Pendent  opera  interrupta,  minseque 
Muronim  ingentes. 

There  was  my  huge  unfinished  church  before  my 
■windows,  and  the  work  of  the  "  British  Critic  "  to  be 
resumed.  There  was  also  the  parish  and  the  school ; 
every  house  to  be  visited,  and  some  visits  to  be  re- 
ceived. But  there  was  not  much  remaining  to  be  done 
with  the  forthcoming  number  of  the  "British  Critic." 
I  should  now  be  glad  to  be  quite  certain  that  I  wrote 
the  very  favorable  review  of  that  most  extraordi- 
nary yet  most  interesting  poem,  "  Nature  a  Parable." 
The  writer  entered  this  earth,  as  it  were  from  another 
sphere,  burdened  with  a  deep  treasure  of  feeling  and 
thought,  speaking  almost  a  foreign  language,  and  de- 
livering his  message  in  strange,  stammering,  not  to  say 
uncouth  enunciations.  I  am  thankful  to  have  been 
one  of  those  who  could  converse  with  him  in  his  writ- 
ings, and  feel  his  great  value.  It  must  have  been  I, 
too,  who  wrote  the  review  of  Formby's  "  Visit  to  the 
East,"  for  I  cannot  think  of  any  alter  ego  likely  to  do 
it.  The  notices  I  had  always  taken  great  pains  with, 
from  a  deep  sense  of  the  presumption  I  was  guilty  of 
in  writing  them  at  all.  On  this  occasion,  when  I 
fully  believed  I  should  never  have  to  review  a  book 
again,  I  took  more  than  usual  pains.  The  notices  of 
this,  the  last  number,  marked  the  epoch.  Huber's 
"  English  Universities"  had  just  been  translated  and 
published  by  Frank  Newman.  The  author  of  "  Nature 
a  Parable  "  had  published  his  Essay  towards  the  Con- 
version of  learned  and  philosophical  Hindoos.  Mr. 
E.  W.  Grinfield  had  published  his  very  useful  Hellen- 
istic edition  of  the  New  Testament.   Albany  Christie 


"BRITISH  CRITIC,"  NO.  LXVIII. 


305 


had  written  on  "  Holy  Virginity."  Toovey  was  now 
publishing  devotional  works  of  the  new  school ;  a 
"  Manual  for  the  Holy  Communion,"  and  extracts 
from  Thomas  a  Kempis  for  the  use  of  the  poor  in  St. 
Giles'  workhouse.  Edward  Blencowe,  to  whom  I  have 
given  a  chapter,  had  gone  to  his  rest,  and  here  was 
his  funeral  sermon  :  "  The  blessedness  of  the  dead 
which  die  in  the  Lord."  There  was  also  a  funeral 
sermon  on  the  death  of  Robert  Anderson,  of  Brighton. 

A  comprehensive  paragraph  rapidly  and  summarily 
dispenses  various  meeds  of  honorable  mention  to 
many  writers  of  Sermons  and  Chai'ges  ;  among  them 
the  Bishop  of  Salisbury,  Robert  Wilberforce,  and 
Archdeacon  Manning,  also  Archdeacon  Sir  Herbert 
Oakley,  Bart.,  Mr.  Dodsworth,  Mr.  Gresley,  and  Dr. 
C.  Wordsworth,  and  many  others.  This  reminds  me 
that  in  some  former  number  I  had  commented,  as  I 
thouglit  in  the  proper  line  of  the  Review,  on  Dr. 
Wordsworth's  new  edition  of  his  "  Ecclesiastical  Bi- 
ography." He  had  struck  out  a  good  deal  of  matter 
to  make  way  for  some  of  a  decidedly  Protestant  char- 
acter; so  at  least  I  remember  it.  I  had  intimated,  in 
I  forget  what  terms,  that  the  book  was  not  the  better 
for  the  substitution.  Not  long  after  that  a  single  line 
in  a  note  from  Newman  informed  me  that  "the  young 
Wordsworths  "  were  by  no  means  gratified  by  my 
remarks.  They  were  not  likely.  One  of  these  touchy 
young  gentlemen  now  presides  over  the  diocese  of 
Lincoln. 

Mr.  J.  E.  Reade  had  published  what  he  was 
pleased  to  call  "  Sacred  Poems  on  Subjects  from  the 
Old  Testament."  Calling  Jael  a  "  fiend,"  he  pro- 
nounces a  tremendous  imprecation  upon  her.  This 
is  quoted  and  observed  upon,  I  forget  by  whom. 

VOL.  II.  20 


306 


RKMINISCENCES. 


Palmer  of  Worcester  and  Dr.  Wiseman  were  at 
issue,  the  former  charging  the  latter  with  quoting 
spurious  and  heretical  writings  ;  and  somebody  had 
stept  in  between  them.  Mr.  ¥.  D.  Maurice  had  been 
writing  to  Lord  Asliley  a  monitory  letter  on  "  Right 
and  Wrong  Methods  of  supporting  Protestantism," 
the  right  method  being,  in  his  opinion,  to  let  anybody 
say  what  he  pleased.  The  writer  of  the  "  notice  "  ob- 
serves in  effect  that  this  is  sound  doctrine,  inasmuch 
as  an  absolute  and  universal  license  of  the  tongue  and 
the  pen  must  destroy  authority,  which,  it  is  presumed, 
is  the  object  of  Protestantism.  The  "  Rationale  Offi- 
ciorum  Divinorum,"  by  Durandus,  had  now  been 
translated  and  published  by  J.  M.  Neale  and  B. 
Webb.  A  "  Tract  upon  Tombstones,"  by  Mr.  Paget, 
elicited  from  me  some  of  my  newly  acquired  conti- 
nental experiences.  The  Temple  Church  had  just 
been  restored  by  Mr.  Burges.  Baptismal  fonts,  orna- 
mental needlework,  and  encaustic  tiles,  the  "  Ecclesi- 
ologist,"  and  an  Architectural  Magazine  are  treated 
raoi'e  at  length,  perhaps,  than  they  would  have  been 
a  few  years  before.  Various  poems,  tales  and  biog- 
raphies of  the  new  school  have  all  the  help  the  last 
words  of  the  "British  Critic"  can  give  them.  A 
kindly  word  is  bestowed  on  a  speech  by  Lord  John 
IManners  on  the  Laws  of  Mortmain,  with  a  protest 
against  posthumous  charity. 

I  must  confess  to  a  certain  tremor  as  I  turn  over 
the  leaves  to  the  very  last  words  of  the  "  British 
Critic  ;  "  and  this  tremor  is  not  set  at  rest  as  one 
observes  the  increasing  confidence,  not  to  say  de- 
pendence, of  a  large  and  increasing  section  of  the 
Anglican  Church  on  its  only  periodical  organ.  Vari- 
ous readers,  I  was  reminded,  had  been  desirous  to  see 


"BRITISH  CRITIC,"  NO.  LXVIII. 


307 


within  a  moderate  compass  the  catalogue  of  the  little 
library,  like  an  Examining  Chaplain's  list,  which  they 
would  have  to  read  before  they  could  be  considered 
graduates  of  the  new  Oxford  school.  Who  were  the 
Oxford  divines,  and  where  could  their  views  be  found 
comprehensively  stated  ?  These  inquirers  were  re- 
ferred to  some  lists  on  the  backs  of  the  "  Tracts  for 
the  Times." 

Another  question  then  came  athwart  the  whole 
course  of  the  English  controversy.  How  about  the 
Established  Church  of  Ireland  ?  Was  it  not  united 
by  Act  of  Parliament  vpith  the  English  Church  ? 
What  duty  did  we  owe  to  it  ?  In  a  word,  what  had 
we  to  do  with  it  ?  The  writer  of  the  notices  appears 
to  have  felt  no  more  difficulty  in  answering  these 
questions  than  Mr.  Gladstone  has  since  lound  in 
extinguishing  them  altogether. 

There  was  then  much  talk  about  a  book  occupying 
a  large  and  mysterious  position  on  the  skirts  of  the 
Oxford  movement.  This  was  Mr.  Kenelm  Digby's 
"  Mores  Catholici,"  the  first  volume  of  which  had 
been  published  by  Dolman  in  1880,  and  this,  with 
other  volumes,  was  out  of  print,  and  could  not  be  ob- 
tained. 

After  satisfying  some  inquiries  after  this  work,  I, 
the  writer  of  these  lines,  did  solemnly  anathematize 
Freemasonry  as  necessarily  Antichristian.  Being  now 
more  than  twice  the  age  I  was  then,  I  feel  I  should 
be  disposed  to  think  an  anathema  above  the  occasion, 
and  to  agree  with  Cardinal  Manning,  who  is  said  to 
have  told  Pio  Nono  that  English  Freemasonry  was 
nothing  more  than  a  Goose  Club. 

Would  that  I  had  stopped  there.  My  own  last 
breath,  and  it  is  a  very  long  drawn  one,  as  British 


308 


EEMINISCENCES. 


Critic  and  Theological  Reviewer,  is  a  rather  fierce  at- 
tack on  my  very  dear  master  and  friend,  Edward 
Churton,  on  the  occasion  of  a  letter  written  by  him 
to  an  Irish  ecclesiastical  journal.  It  is  true  the  letter 
was  not  a  wise  one,  and  certainly  was  not  kind  to  the 
Oxford  writers,  and  poor  Edward  Churton  must  have 
been  fairly  beside  himself  when  he  wrote  it.  How 
otherwise  could  he  have  imagined  there  was  any 
chance  of  conciliating  Irish  Protestantism  ?  Had  he 
been  in  the  full  possession  of  his  calm  and  clear  intel- 
lect he  would  have  known  that  no  sacrifice  he  could 
make,  no  sop  he  could  administer,  would  propitiate 
that  animal.  It  might  have  accepted  the  Oxford 
writers  as  an  instalment,  but  it  would  have  opened 
its  maw  speedily  to  devour  him  as  well.  Edward 
Churton  must  have  forgotten  his  learning,  too,  when 
he  appealed  to  Bishop  Horne  and  Jones  of  Nayland 
as  men  who  never  had  an  idea  not  fully  warranted  by 
the  Prayer  Book  and  the  Thirty-nine  Articles.  How- 
ever, I  am  very  sorry  indeed  that  such  were  my  last 
words,  and  such  the  man  they  were  spoken  of.  On 
the  opposite  page  is  announced  as  preparing  for  pub- 
lication, "Lives  of  the  English  Saints,"  edited  by  the 
Rev.  John  Henry  Newman  B.  D.,  Fellow  of  Oriel 
College. 


CHAPTER  CXVI. 

INQUIRY  AND  INDECISION. 

A  WRITER  wlio  edited  the  penultimate  number  of 
the  "British  Critic,"  went  into  a  Roman  Catholic 
country,  spent  weeks  in  confidential  communication 
with  Seminary  priests,  and  returned  to  edit  the  ulti- 
mate number,  giving  notice,  at  the  same  time,  of  his 
retirement,  may  be  supposed  to  have  some  account  to 
give  of  himself.  I  cannot,  however,  say  that  this  ac- 
count was  ever  asked  of  me.  The  interest  of  the  re- 
ligious and  theological  world  was  then  drawn  in  an- 
other direction,  —  other  directions  indeed,  for  there 
were  others  besides  the  chief,  then  occupying  much 
more  attention  than  I  had  ever  wished  to  occupy. 
They  were  at  Oxford  and  London  ;  they  were  before 
the  world,  and  they  gave  their  names.  They  wrote 
what  they  spoke,  and  tliey  spoke  what  they  wrote, 
instead  of  the  cold  shadowy  impersonality  of  the  anon- 
ymous writer.  Newman,  always  turning  his  face  to 
his  assailants,  had  retreated  from  the  visible  battle- 
field of  the  University,  battered  and  buffeted  by  Ser- 
mons, Charges,  and  Censures ;  by  sudden  assaults 
from  the  right  hand  and  from  the  left,  by  strange  for- 
mations in  which  all  differences  were  merged  to  gain 
a  momentary  advantage  over  a  common  enemj',  as  he 
seemed  to  be  believed.  He  was  now  at  Littlemore, 
and  "  What  next  ? "  was  the  question  of  the  day. 
On  the  other  hand,  his  Oxford  allies  were  the  more 


310 


REMINISCENCES. 


prominent,  and  not  the  less  courageous,  for  his  ab- 
sence from  the  front  of  action.  They  bad  Oxford  to 
themselves.  I  might  drop  off  as  a  rotten  branch  if  I 
pleased. 

I  have,  however,  an  account  to  give,  fcjr  I  had  al- 
ways kept  an  account  in  my  mind,  if  nowhere  else. 
It  was  a  very  different  account  from  that  which  New- 
man has  given  to  the  woi'ld.  He  was  at  once  the  cen- 
tre of  a  grand  history,  and,  in  his  own  inner  being, 
of  a  great  spiritual  development.  Any  account  I 
could  render  would  be  not  so  much  the  workings  of 
a  spiritual  life,  or  even  of  an  ordinary  well  regulated 
conscience,  as  of  prepossessions,  and  sentiments,  and 
reasonings,  and  imaginations ;  of  likings  and  dislik- 
ings  ;  of  old  prejudices,  of  sudden  impulses,  and  of 
other  such  stuff  as  this  world  is  mostly  made  of. 
Such  as  it  was,  however,  all  this  account  was  before 
me,  as  if  I  stood  before  a  tribunal.  The  matter  of  ifc 
was  not  in  my  inner  being.  I  had  only  the  percep- 
tion of  it.  I  had  considered  over  and  over  again, 
"  How  far  does  this  commit  me?  "  Where  I  gave  in 
I  noted  it  as  if  I  had  passed  a  landmark.  Was  it 
necessary  I  should  so  commit  myself  ?  I  came  to  the 
conclusion  that  it  was  necessary,  for  not  to  advance 
was  to  recede,  and  to  recede  I  was  not  prepared  yet. 
In  the  works  of  all  these  writers  whom  I  made  my- 
self answerable  for,  I  can  recall  but  little  that  did  not 
seem  to  be  in  mj^  mind  already,  only  waiting  till  I 
had  the  power  of  expressing  it,  or  of  recognizing  it 
as  expressed  by  otliers.  In  the  fearful  irresponsibil- 
ity of  one's  own  thoughts,  I  had  already  gone  very 
far. 

But  in  what  region  had  I  gone  far  ?  Was  it  in  the 
region  of  a  living,  or  even  of  a  positive  faith  ?  It  was 


INQUIRY  AND  INDECISION. 


311 


not.  It  was  in  the  region  in  which  I  liad  accepted 
the  creations  of  poets,  the  vagaries  of  philosophers, 
the  systems  of  dreamers,  and  the  almost  equally  fan- 
ciful conceptions  of  historians.  It  was  the  region  in 
which  I  had  long  before  been  fumbling  at  a  mad  phi- 
losophy of  ray  own.  For  many  years  of  my  life,  my 
chief  relipcious  conclusions  had  been  of  a  negative 
character,  one  continual  revolt  against  the  hoUowness, 
flirasiness,  and  stupidity  of  "  Evangelical  "  teaching. 
That  could  do  one  no  good.  Better  close  with  any 
heresy,  not  very  extravagant,  than  be  only  learning 
to  believe  nothing  at  all.  It  was  some  years  before 
that  I  was  spending  a  day  in  a  mixed  company  of  the 
new  school  and  the  old.  The  former  freely  criticised 
some  score  or  two  popular  preachers  and  writers.  A 
hitherto  silent  listener  took  advantage  of  an  opening 
to  ask,  "  What  preacher  is  there  that  you  do  like  ?  " 

I  suppose  the  truest  as  well  as  the  most  compre- 
hensive account  to  be  given  of  niy  early  religious 
career  is  that  I  was  simply  following  my  own  sweet 
will  and  my  own  idle  fancies,  and  that  such  being  the 
case,  I  had  no  call  to  find  fault  with  any  preaching 
or  any  system.  Reason,  however,  had  some  voice  in 
the  matter.  Though  we  read  the  awful  warning, 
"Beware  of  hypocrisy,"  the  "good  people,"  in  the 
common  estimate  of  that  period,  seemed  to  think 
hypocrisy  the  last  thing  to  be  afraid  of.  I  knew  well 
I  must  be  spiritually  changed,  and  so  regenerate. 
I  knew  well  that  Christ  must  dwell  in  me,  and  I  in 
Him  ;  and  that  I  must  be  holy  even  as  He  is  holy. 
But  if  I  listened  to  these  good  people  I  was  bound, 
immediately  upon  any  suddenly  increaocd  conviction 
of  these  truths,  to  begin  preaching  to  all  about  me, 
and  proclaiming  a  conversion,  which  in  truth  I  be- 


312 


REMINISCENCES. 


lieved  must  be  a  life's  work,  and  a  thing  to  be  demon- 
strated in  deeds  not  in  words. 

Yet,  was  I  true  to  my  own  sober  and  judicious  con- 
victions, thus  carefully  adapted  to  personal  conven- 
ience and  to  social  exigencies  ?  That  I  was  not.  I 
might  be  wise,  that  is  I  might  be  forming  wise  opin- 
ions upon  pei'sons  and  things,  and  schools  of  preach- 
ing, but  that  was  all  the  wisdom  I  had.  I  was  wise 
and  foolish  at  once,  and  I  knew  it.  I  was  all  things, 
not  to  all  persons,  but  to  myself.  So  heterogeneous 
and  conflicting  did  I  feel  the  constituents  of  my  men- 
tal being  that,  taught  by  my  own  experience,  I  never 
had  the  least  difliculty  in  conceiving  a  person  pos- 
sessed of  any  number  of  evil  spirits.  To  me  it  was 
the  same  thing  as  a  waste  or  a  ruin  being  occupied 
by  all  sorts  of  bad  chai'acters  or  strange  vermin.  My 
difficulty  rather  was  the  complete  inhabitation  and 
dominion  of  one  Spirit,  commanding  all  the  posts, 
and  throwing  the  light  of  truth  everywhere.  I  lived 
in  a  rebellion,  and  could  only  conceive  warfare. 
Often  have  I  said  to  myself,  "  To  be  a  good  master 
you  must  first  be  a  good  servant,  and  a  good  servant 
I  have  never  been." 

This  confusion,  which  was  in  my  own  nature, 
affected  all  my  vain,  desultory,  fruitless  essays  in  the 
field  of  theological  inquiry.  At  every  return  to  them 
I  felt  as  a  man  resuming  a  calculation  or  rearranging 
the  papers  on  his  table.  I  was  conscious  of  a  tacit 
reproof  when  I  found  so  many  men  had  clear,  defi- 
nite, and  absolutely  certain  convictions.  It  would, 
however,  be  possible,  I  said  to  myself,  to  produce  any 
number  of  such  men,  utterly  disagreeing  with  one 
another ;  so  that  their  happy  confidence  must  be  in 
the  temperament,  and  therefore  not  at  command,  or 


INQUIRY  AND  INDECISION. 


313 


necessarily  associated  with  one  belief  in  comparison 
with  all  other  beliefs. 

I  have  mentioned  the  question  of  assent  or  dissent, 
as  arising  every  now  and  then  ;  and  upon  a  passage 
here  or  there.  This  had  always  been  the  case  as  to 
the  writings  of  Roman  Catholics.  Conscious  as  I 
was  of  a  difference  of  tone,  yet  they  had  generally 
carried  me  along  with  them,  and  a  hundred  times  had 
I  said  that  if  I  had  been  born  and  bred  a  Roman 
Catholic,  I  should  so  have  remained  in  spite  of  any 
earthly  terrors  or  inducements.  Only,  every  now 
and  then  I  came  on  a  passage  which  both  my  relig- 
ious engagements  and  my  acquired  habit  compelled 
me  to  object  to.  This  was  a  common  remark  among 
all  our  Oxford  friends,  that  is  all  that  had  any  part 
in  the  movement;  I  suspect,  too,  in  some  who  had 
no  part.  One  I  will  not  name,  because  in  truth  he 
lived  much  more  in  what  he  cordially  accepted  tlian 
in  what  he  could  not  quite  accept,  for  he  never  liked 
criticism.  His  expression  was  that  in  reading  a  great 
Roman  Catholic  author  you  might  wish  to  pass  your 
pen  through  a  word,  or  a  line,  in  the  course  of  many 
pages ;  while,  as  to  another  class  of  writers,  you 
might  not  be  able  to  do  that,  but,  after  a  page  or 
two,  you  put  the  book  down  and  did  not  open  it 
again. 

I  had  now  for  many  years,  latterly  with  pressure 
and  exigency,  been  compelled  to  consider  various 
points  of  the  controversy  between  England  and  the 
great  Church,  which  for  I  know  not  how  many  cent- 
uries has  claimed  to  be  the  Mother  Church  of  all 
Christendom.  I  had  been  compelled  to  use  not  only 
my  own  jiulgment,  but  the  judgment  of  men  resolute 
to  incjuire  and  unflinching  as  to  results.     The  ir- 


814 


REMINISCENCES. 


refragable  logic  of  this  or  that  writer  did  not  quite 
convince  me.  I  might  allow  myself  to  be  whirled  in 
a  dizzy  maze  by  Ward  for  several  pages,  and  find  my- 
self able  to  stand  on  my  own  legs.  But  the  atmos- 
phere of  reasonable  discussion  had  been  telling  on 
me.  Samuel  Wilberforce,  in  one  of  the  most  famous 
of  his  sermons,  urged  Oxford  undergraduates  to  en- 
tertain no  doubt,  to  stamp  it  out  as  they  would  a 
spark  in  a  magazine,  and  recoil  from  it  with  horror. 
Such  advice  is  useless.  It  is  vain  to  dissuade  men 
from  an  inquiry  by  telling  them  that  it  will  probably 
lead  them  away  from  their  present  belief.  They  will 
be  sure  to  rush  into  the  forbidden  ground.  Whoever 
prohibits  doubts  starts  an  inquiry. 

But  there  was  more  than  this.  The  great  contro- 
versy was  being  pressed  with  equal  vigor  in  both 
directions.  Already,  fifty  years  ago,  the  question  lay 
between  more  belief  and  less  belief,  widening  every 
day  to  much  belief  and  none  at  all.  From  the  East 
and  from  the  South  a  portentous  cloud  of  infidelity 
was  rolling  upon  this  land.  The  vast  superiority  of 
Germany  and  France  was  in  many  Oxford  mouths. 
As  critics  and  scholars,  as  linguists  and  Orientalists, 
as  thinkei's  and  philosophers,  as  historians,  and  even 
as  theologians  in  the  "  undenominational  "  sense,  we 
could  not  compare  with  them,  and  could  not  hope  to 
rise  to  an  equality  without  first  sitting  at  their  feet. 
This  was  an  appeal  to  reason,  even  with  the  probable 
consequence  of  an  entire  abandonment  of  our  most 
cherislied  convictions 

At  that  time,  as  in  all  times,  and  not  without  a 
cause,  there  was  a  cry  against  those  who  halt  between 
two  opinions ;  who  either  will  not  decide,  or  will  not 
declare  themselves.     Certainly  life  is  too  short  for 


INQUIRY  AND  INDECISION. 


315 


indecision,  whether  of  thought  or  of  deed.  But  what 
were  the  great  facts  of  that  period  ?  On  the  one 
hand  there  were  many  men  whose  piety  and  truthful- 
ness I  should  not  be  permitted  to  question  were  I  so 
disposed,  who  to  all  appearance  were  prosecuting  the 
most  vital  inquiries  with  the  aid  of  rationalist  and 
even  atheistical  writers ;  knit  together  in  one  partner- 
ship and  bound  to  the  same  conclusions.  Speaking 
for  myself,  and  with  more  knowledge  of  Hampden's 
Lectures  than  I  then  had,  as  well  as  a  higher  esti- 
mate of  their  ability,  I  look  in  vain  for  anything  in 
them  to  save  the  writer  from  the  last  fatal  plunge. 
Hampden,  however,  was  but  one  of  many. 

On  the  other  hand  there  were  men  of  at  least 
equal  piety  and  trutlifulness  who  were  pursuing  an- 
other inquiry  in  the  direction  of  faith  by  the  aid  of 
authority.  The  intermediate  mass  that  did  not  move 
and  did  not  inquire  was  daily  diminishing,  and  did 
not  even  command  respect.  The  great  majority 
were  inquiring,  that  is  to  say  inquiring  honestly,  and 
not  merely  beating  about  for  arguments  to  support 
a  foregone  conclusion.  Thus  the  Oxford  world  was 
steadily  resolving  itself  into  two  opposite  schools  of 
sentiment  and  opinion,  however  we  may  please  to 
regard  that  mental  process. 

The  common  idea  of  a  theological  inquiry  is  grand 
and  heroic.  It  is  assumed  to  be  entered  upon  delib- 
erately, leisurely,  and  in  due  order.  The  inquirer  is 
supposed  to  possess  the  moral  requisites,  at  least  in 
the  negative  sense  of  freedom  from  vicious  prejudice, 
and  to  have  laid  down  his  first  principles.  He  then 
attacks  the  whole  question,  addresses  himself  to  tlie 
several  parts  of  it  in  turn,  and  gathers  the  light  they 
throw  on  one  another.    He  is  under  no  compulsion 


316 


REMINISCENCES. 


to  hasten  the  process  and  decide  precipitately.  The 
truth  will  wait  for  him,  and  if  he  is  sufficiently  loyal 
to  it,  and  honestly  seeks  it,  he  must  finally  attain 
to  it. 

My  case  was  the  very  contrary.  If  I  had  not  pos- 
itively I'ecoiled  from  the  great  question,  I  had  never 
dreamt  of  facing  it.  The  lesser  questions,  whether 
of  principle  or  of  detail,  had  been  successively  forced 
on  me,  often  without  warning.  I  had  then  not  to 
decide,  but  to  accept.  Some  of  the  writers,  indeed, 
allowed  me  scant  time  for  deliberation,  and  truth 
compels  me  to  admit  that  I  must  have  passed  a  sen- 
tence here  and  there  without  a  mental  decision,  flat- 
tering myself  at  the  time  perhaps  that  the  mood  was 
that  of  controversy,  and  the  surrender  hypothetical. 
I  was  never  stretched  on  the  wheel,  but  one  by  one 
the  harder  points  of  my  weak  and  ill-compacted  moral 
f]'ame  were  torn  from  me.  Perhaps  they  were  like  a 
child's  first  set  of  teeth,  hardly  worth  the  keeping. 
My  own  unwarrantable  self-confidence  had  put  me  in 
that  position,  not  to  speak  of  the  levity  which  im- 
pelled me  into  a  struggle  I  was  not  fit  for.  Whatever 
the  issue  might  be,  such  a  process  was  not  honorable, 
and  no  honor  have  I  ever  claimed  for  it.  I  have  even 
been  ready  to  accept  its  penalties.  In  so  doing  I 
render  tribute  both  to  the  Divine  government,  and  to 
the  voice  that  whispers  within. 


CHAPTER  CXVII. 


FIEST  IMPRESSIONS  OF  ROMAN  CATHOLIC  WORSHIP. 

I  HAD  not  gone  to  Normandy  with  any  idea  of  be- 
ing helped  thereby  in  my  path  through  the  contro- 
versy to  ■which  I  had  committed  myself,  and  in  which 
I  had  been  borne  along.  All  I  expected  was  an 
agreeable  change,  rest  and  amusement,  foreign  man- 
ners and  customs,  picturesque  architecture,  with 
scarcely  even  the  hope  of  a  good  French  acquaint- 
ance. The  choice  was  in  fact  made  for  me,  and  was 
perhaps  owing  to  a  mere  personal  consideration.  We 
had  been  told  that  my  wife's  Huguenot  ancestors 
were  from  the  neighborhood  of  Caen. 

Either  on  principle  or  for  lack  of  oppm-tunity,  I 
had  never  before  entered  a  Roman  Catholic  chapel, 
since  some  friends  took  me  to  Moorfields  Chapel  the 
second  Sunday  after  its  opening,  in  1821  I  think.  So 
what  I  now  saw  would  come  upon  me  with  all  the 
force  of  novelty,  and  it  immediately  had  a  great  fasci- 
nation for  me.  This  was  truly  worship  I  There  was 
the  sense  of  a  Divine  presence.  All  hearts  were 
moved  as  one.  The  music  seemed  to  me  so  much  more 
expressive  than  our  own  pretty  chants  and  singsong 
melodies.  There  was  a  charm  in  the  very  roughness 
of  the  voices,  the  monotony  of  the  big  ophicleides  or 
gigantic  bassoons,  the  rush-bottomed  chairs,  and  the 
freedom  with  which  the  people  seated  themselves 
here  and  there,  which  seemed  to  speak  of  a  rude 


318 


REMINISCENCES. 


antiquity.  This  I  saw  in  tlie  midst  of  our  own 
grandest  historical  associations.  I  had  been  pre- 
pared to  be  disappointed.  I  had  repeatedly  read  and 
had  partly  believed  that  Roman  Catholic  worship 
was  without  reverence,  unreal,  and  wholly  beyond 
the  understanding  of  all  but  a  few  scholars;  that  the 
clergy  set  the  example  of  ill-behavior,  whether  in 
church  or  out  of  it ;  that  they  talked,  laughed,  and 
took  snuff  at  the  most  solemn  parts  of  the  service ; 
that  hardly  ever  was  a  man  to  be  seen  in  church,  cer- 
tainly never  a  man  of  education ;  that  the  morals  of 
Roman  Catholic  populations  were  flagitiously  and 
shamefully  bad. 

I  can  only  say  that  what  I  saw  was  the  contrary 
of  all  this.  This  I  say,  knowing  that  no  single 
testimony  is  sufficient  to  decide  such  a  question, 
and  that  in  matter  of  fact,  thousands  of  tourists  have 
gone  about  France  seeing  only  what  their  pet 
preachers  and  writers  had  told  them  to  see,  and 
what  accordingly  they  had  made  up  their  minds  to 
see,  an  exceedingly  bad  state  of  things.  The  French 
appeared  to  me  in  the  main  a  religious  and  orderly 
people,  honest  and  polite,  and,  as  all  know,  frugal, 
independent,  and  industrious.  Their  worship  seemed 
to  me  hearty  and  intelligent.  It  was  perhaps  a 
childish  remark,  but  I  frequently  made  it  to  myself, 
that  this  was  worship.  That  is  to  all  appearance  the 
one  thing  often  sadly  wanting  in  an  English  congre- 
gation. Some  inquiry  led  me  to  believe  that  the 
majority  of  a  French  congregation  followed  the 
Psalms,  and  such  parts  of  the  service  as  are  audibly 
said  or  sung  as  the  act  of  the  congregation,  quite  as 
well  as  the  English  generally  follow  the  Prayer  Book. 
Out  of  service-time  there  were  always  people  in  the 


ROMAN  CATHOLIC  WORSHIP. 


319 


churches,  saying  their  own  prayers,  whatever  they 
were.  In  the  streets  there  were  numbers  of  little 
girls  going  about  in  their  white  Confirmation  dresses. 
They  had  a  serious  air,  and  they  seemed  the  objects 
of  a  tender  interest.  At  all  hours,  early  and  late,  the 
church  bells  announced  that  something  was  going  on. 
All  these  things,  and  other  incidents  of  daily  occur- 
rence, conduced  to  a  favorable  impression  of  the  peo- 
ple, and  of  the  system. 

But  then  came  points  which  the  unaccustomed 
English  mind  cannot  but  be  startled  and  offended  at. 
Let  me  treat  these  matters  as  they  come,  and  as  they 
must  come  to  the  English  visitor.  I  approach  a 
church  door.  Upon  it,  or  over  it,  I  see  printed  or 
painted  in  large  letters,  Indulgentia,  plenaria,  per- 
petua,  quotidiana.  The  printed  papers  offer  this  act 
of  the  Divine  mercy,  whatever  it  may  be,  on  the 
condition  of  certain  devotions,  endowed  apparently 
with  a  traditionary  or  authoritative  value.  What 
does  all  this  mean  ?  Where,  and  of  what  nature, 
is  this  indulgence  ?  I  often  tried  to  understand  it ; 
often  was  it  explained  to  me,  I  fear  in  vain.  Gen- 
erally it  seemed  a  promise  of  ease  and  relief  to  the 
soul,  and  the  soul  certainly  often  wants  that.  Such 
relief  cannot  be  reasonably  expected  without  some 
acts  of  faith  on  our  part,  for  we  must  believe,  and  we 
must  show  our  belief,  before  we  can  be  helped  and 
comforted.  The  calculation  seemed  natural,  but  the 
whole  matter  remained  very  nebulous.  Does  the 
Almighty  run  up  accounts  with  us  in  this  business- 
like fashion  ?  But  he  who  believes  anything  is  on  his 
way  to  believe  a  good  deal  more,  for  faith  is  not  an 
operation  that  takes  its  stand  and  says,  "  Thus  far 
and  no  farther."    Its  natural  movement  is  forward, 


320 


REMINISCENCES. 


and  it  is  even  too  apt  to  think  small  difficulties  of  no 
account. 

Inside  the  church  door  is  the  holy  water  stoup. 
The  natives  put  their  fingers  into  it,  sprinkle  them- 
selves, and  cross  themselves.  There  is  always  some 
privileged  beggar  who  scrutinizes  every  arrival.  He 
offers  to  the  native  a  brush  just  dipped  in  the  holy 
water,  but  lowers  his  brush  and  asks  alms  from  the 
foreigner.  It  is  natural,  but  not  pious,  that  he  is 
better  pleased  with  the  heretical  sous  than  with  the 
act  of  Catholic  intercommunion,  friendly  and  pictur- 
esque though  it  be. 

But  what  is  going  on  in  the  church  ?  We  look  in 
the  direction  of  the  altar,  and  soon  perceive  that 
there  is  more  than  one  altar,  several  indeed,  nay 
many  in  a  large  church.  What  can  this  mean  ? 
There  is  but  one  true  Altar,  one  Sacrifice,  one  Vic- 
tim, one  Propitiation.  I  have  always  been  advanced 
enough  to  believe  in  a  priesthood,  and  that  I  am  my- 
self a  priest,  in  a  representative  character,  and  with 
derivative  functions ;  but  this  multitude  and  even 
variety  of  altars  was  a  new  experience  to  me.  It 
is  not  new  as  a  matter  of  knowledge,  historj',  and 
architecture,  for  everybody  who  has  dabbled  in  the 
latter  subject  knows  that  St.  Paul's  Cathedral  is  ex- 
pressly built  for  a  dozen  or  more  altars,  and  that  in 
our  own  village  churches  there  is  often  found,  perhaps 
in  some  comfortable  family  pew,  the  piscina,  and  even 
marks  in  the  masonry  indicating  an  altar.  But  that 
is  ever  new  which  is  seen  for  the  first  time. 

A  priest  in  a  vestment,  which  to  the  unaccustomed 
English  eye  looks  gorgeous,  but  which  to  the  native 
apprehension  is  old,  faded,  dirty,  and  threadbare,  is 
doing  what?    This  is  the  very  crisis  of  the  whole 


ROMAN  CATHOLIC  WORSHIP. 


321 


question  dividing  nations,  languages,  woi'lds, — hap- 
pily no  longer  with  burning  and  bloodshed.  What 
can  he  be  doing  ?  There  is  not  a  soul  there  besides 
himself,  except  a  little  boy,  of  Standard  IV.,  V.,  or 
VI.,  as  may  be,  also  in  what  an  ordinary  Englishman 
would  call  priestly  attire.  He  has  a  surplice,  very 
short,  transparent,  embroidered,  and  fitting  close  to  a 
colored  vestment  below.  The  only  Church  of  Eng- 
land service  at  which  this  kind  of  thing  could  then  be 
seen  was  at  the  Chapel  Royal,  St.  James's,  much  fre- 
quented by  Lord  Ashley.  These  two  —  but  before  I 
can  concentrate  my  attention  upon  these  mysterious 
beings  I  observe  that  there  are  several  such  pairs 
seemingly  doing  the  like  at  other  altars.  These  two 
are  performing  in  dumb  show.  The  priest  is  stand- 
ing, kneeling,  passing  to  and  fro,  crossing  himself, 
frequently  bowing  or  bending  his  knees.  Hardly  a 
murmur  reaches  you,  but  a  bell  is  tinkled  several 
times,  and  after  some  specially  solemn  stage  the  priest 
turns  round  and  holds  up  something.  Abruptly,  be- 
cause unexpectedly  and  unaccountably,  the  perform- 
ance closes,  the  work  is  done  ;  the  priest  covers  up 
something  and  walks  away,  attended  by  the  boy, 
whom  by  this  time  you  have  recovered  enough  to  call 
an  acolyte,  and  to  think  possibly  is  of  one  of  the  seven 
orders  of  Roman  Catholic  clergy. 

But  here  is  the  wonder  of  all.  There  is  no  con- 
gregation. There  might  be,  for,  as  you  look  about, 
you  see  that  there  are  a  few  worshippers,  one,  two, 
or  three,  at  the  other  altars.  So  there  may  or  may 
not  be  a  congregation  for  this  service,  or  whatever 
else  is  its  proper  name.  That  is  an  indifferent  mat- 
ter. The  priest  alone  is  sufficient,  for  the  boy  can 
only  be  regarded  as  an  official  appendage  or  technicnl 

VOL.  II.  21 


322 


REMINISCEXCES. 


complement.  This  is  mass.  It  is  a  low  mass.  It  is 
for  some  special  benefit.  It  has  been  demanded.  By 
and  by  other  priests  have  finished  their  work,  and  are 
passing  along  tlie  floor  of  the  church,  to  this  or  that 
door,  carrying  something  with  them. 

You  know  enough  of  the  matter  to  recognize  in  this 
the  Host,  the  Body  of  Him  who  was  once  offered, 
once  for  all,  for  our  sins.  So  the  Body  of  Christ  can 
be  repeatedly  and  simultaneously  offered  at  different 
altars  in  the  same  church,  and  exhibited  and  carried 
about  and  reserved,  — that  is  closeted  in  darkness,  to 
be  brought  out  again  when  there  slrall  be  need  of  it. 
The  stranger  may  have  heard  of  all  this,  and  read 
of  all  this,  and  may  have  racked  his  brains  about 
it  to  consider  whether  it  comes  within  any  reasona- 
ble comprehension.  But  there  is  a  very  old  saying 
about  the  eyes  doing  their  work  quicker  and  more 
thoroughly  than  the  ears,  and  now  you  see  it  all. 
If  the  stranger  has  had  to  subscribe  the  Thirty-nine 
Articles,  he  has  pronounced  a  very  decided  judgment 
on  all  this,  and  may  justly  have  misgivings  whether 
he  has  any  right  to  be  there,  looking  quietly  upon 
what  some  of  his  neighbors  at  home  call  blasphemous 
mummery,  etc.,  etc. 

But  as  the  stranger  ventures  to  creep  about  the 
church,  he  comes  on  something  which  is  quite  intelli- 
gible, which  requires  no  racking  of  brains,  no  divid- 
ing of  unities,  no  assumption  that  one  is  many  and 
many  one,  no  feat  of  metaphysics  whatever,  not  even 
a  civilized  intellect.  Before  what  the  stranger  — 
certainly  the  little  girl  at  his  side  —  will  pronounce 
a  large  gayly-dressed  doll,  the  very  counterpart  of 
which  she  has  seen  in  many  a  London  shop  window, 
a  crowd  of  women  and  children  are  on  their  knees, 


ROMAN  CATHOLIC  WORSHIP. 


823 


saying  their  prayers.  It  is  the  Virgin  Mother,  with 
or  without  the  Babe.  Many  candles  are  burning 
before  her.  This  is  no  solitary  performance.  Christ 
Diay  have  been  offered  a  dozen  times  in  that  church 
since  early  sunrise,  without  one  beloved  disciple  or 
one  Mary  at  the  foot  of  His  cross,  or  at  the  opened 
tomb ;  but  the  Mother  never  lacks  attendance  or 
worship.  What  she  has  to  give  all  are  eager  for. 
She  is  here,  to  the  stranger's  eyes  at  least,  "  the 
Way,  the  Truth,  and  the  Life."  It  is  she  that  has 
overcome  sin  and  death,  and  opened  the  way  to  eter- 
nal life,  with  many  an  earnest  of  that  gift,  and  many 
a  consolation  of  present  misery,  to  be  poured  down 
on  those  that  ask  for  it.  If  they  do  but  seek  she  may 
be  found.  She  does  not  even  impose  importunity  as 
the  condition  of  success.  Surely  this  is  an  idol,  the 
stranger  says.  If  this  be  not  an  idol,  what  is  ?  Such 
indeed  were  my  own  reflections. 

The  stranger  is  soon  made  aware  of  a  good  deal  of 
caprice  and  favoritism,  as  it  seems  to  him.  The  al- 
tars of  the  Saints,  such  at  least  he  conceives  them  to 
be  from  the  pictures,  are  generally  neglected.  It  is 
not  even  every  altar  of  the  Virgin  that  is  equally 
popular  and  equally  nccredited,  so  to  speak.  A  title, 
an  attribute,  an  incident,  a  tradition  makes  all  the 
difference.  Even  an  hour  spent,  profanely  as  some 
would  say,  in  going  in  and  out  of  churches,  reveals 
mysteries  which  never  can  be  fathomed. 

The  stranger  suspends  his  judgment  till  Sunday 
comes,  when  he  will  attend  high  mnss  and  see  a  full 
congregation.  He  is  greatly  impressed  with  the  fixed 
and.  concentrated  attention  of  the  multitude,  vast  in 
a  cathedral  or  a  large  church  ;  with  their  instanta- 
neous dropping  on  their  knees,  and  other  tokens  of 


324 


REMINISCENCES. 


joint-worship.  But  the  performance  at  tlie  altar  as- 
sumes still  more  the  look  of  a  grand  pantomime,  at 
first  quite  unintelligible.  A  plate  comes  round  and 
is  impressively  urged  upon  the  stranger's  notice  ;  by 
and  by  another  pliite  ;  then  a  third.  They  are  for 
the  poor,  for  the  church,  and  for  the  dead.  Immense 
baskets  of  sweet  cake,  in  good  sized  lumps,  were 
handed  round  at  the  time  whereof  I  am  writing,  and 
many  of  the  congregation,  especially  the  young  peo- 
ple, almost  scrambled  for  it.  What  a  travesty  of 
communion,  thought  I  to  myself  ;  but  I  seemed  to 
have  no  clioice ;  I  took  some  of  the  cake  and  ate  it, 
making  a  note  to  ask  some  one  what  it  signified,  and 
what  I  had  been  doing.  I  believe  it  to  be  actually  a 
tradition  of  the  Communion  cake  or  loaf,  as  it  vpas  in 
Apostolic  times.  Some  say  it  is  the  primitive  Agapse. 

What  more  was  there  to  strike  the  stranger  as  he 
walked  about  town  or  country  ?  There  were  the  co- 
lossal crucifixes,  painted  to  life,  at  the  cross  roads 
and  other  conspicuous  points.  There  wei'e  representa- 
tions of  purgatory,  in  the  rudest  elemental  form.  Any 
one  with  a  particle  of  Paganism  in  his  nature  —  and 
1  have  more  than  a  particle  —  understands  purga- 
tory, and  is  disposed  to  accept  the  general  idea. 
But  general  ideas  are  incapable  of  representation, 
and  do  not  affect  the  majority,  which  uses  sense  more 
than  reason.  So  if  purgatory  is  to  be  set  forth  at  all, 
it  must  be  in  some  concrete  form. 

I  have  said  little  of  the  appearance  the  Roman 
Catholic  system  made  in  the  streets.  Monks  and 
nuns  were  evidently  reduced  to  the  modest  conditions 
of  common  utility  and  appreciable  service.  Such 
nuns  as  one  saw  were  Sisters  of  Mercy  or  teachers. 
I  cannot  recall  seeing  in  Normandy  any  one  that  I 
should  call  simply  a  monk. 


ROMAN  CATHOLIC  WORSHIP. 


325 


One  appearance  I  did  see  more  than  once.  You 
hear  a  small  bell,  which  makes  a  momentary  sensa- 
tion. Turning  to  the  direction  of  the  sound,  you  see 
a  little  procession  ;  a  priest  in  vestments  carrying 
something  under  a  small  canopy  ;  an  acolyte,  a  beadle 
or  two,  one  of  them  perhaps  carrying  a  tall  staff  sur- 
mounted by  an  ornamental  lantern,  such  as  one  may 
see  in  the  attics  and  lumber-rooms  of  our  old  country 
houses.  As  the  procession  passes  the  people  stop  a 
moment,  take  off  their  hats,  and  then  walk  on. 

This  is  the  Host.  It  is  the  consecrated  wafer,  now 
become  by  Roman  reckoning  the  very  Body  of  our 
Lord.  It  is  on  its  way  to  a  sick  or  dying  bed.  The 
procession  appeals  alike  to  reverence,  to  the  common 
sympathy  with  suffering,  and  to  that  sense  of  mortal- 
ity which  no  profaneness  can  dispel  or  wholly  deprive 
of  its  seriousness.  Death  is  near,  and  the  opportu- 
nity is  taken  to  proclaim  that  here  is  Life. 

But  upon  the  whole  the  appearance  made  in  Nor- 
mandy was  far  less  than  what  I  afterwards  saw  even 
in  Belgium,  and  of  course  far  less  than  what  I  have 
since  witnessed  often  at  Rome.  The  Belgian  clergy 
are  evidently  resolved  not  to  lose  by  want  of  self-as- 
sertion. 

At  Rome  I  was  once  watching,  from  the  steps  of 
St.  Peter's,  the  evolutions  of  a  body  of  400  French 
soldiers.  In  a  moment  they  all  went  down  on  their 
knees.  So  my  memory  tells  me,  but  if  any  one  is 
prepared  to  show  that  this  is  impossible,  and  that 
they  only  grounded  their  arms,  I  submit.  Looking 
about  I  saw  that  the  Host,  under  a  high  canopy,  had 
entered  from  the  Borgo,  and  was  passing  into  the 
long  street  running  along  the  south  side  of  the  Tiber. 
It  occurred  to  me  there  could  be  no  necessity  for  en- 


326 


KEMIXISCENCES. 


tering  the  piazza,  and  I  was  told  that  this  route  had 
probabl}^  been  taken  with  the  express  purpose  of 
"winning  this  recognition  from  the  French  soldiers. 

Poor  fellows !  they  are  a  simple  race,  and  much 
put  upon.  In  the  5-ear  1848  Paris  was  filled  with 
regiments  fresh  from  the.  provinces,  mere  lads  from 
home  and  school.  They  were  filling  the  churches  and 
doing  their  devotions  at  the  altars,  while  the  Gardes 
Mobiles  were  gambling  in  the  worst  female  company 
on  the  steps  before  the  entrance.  The  soldiers  of  the 
line  were  then  receiving,  I  was  told,  three  sous  a  day 
pocket  money,  while  the  daily  pay  of  the  Garde  Mo- 
bile was  a  franc  and  a  half.  These  poor  fellows  had 
been  accustomed  to  be  drilled  by  the  clergy.  At 
Rome  they  had  to  bear  more.  Coming  one  day  out  of 
St.  Peter's  with  four  English  ladies,  we  got  into  a 
fiacre^  and  gave  our  orders.   A  line  of  French  soldiers 

—  for  a  parade  then  was  a  matter  of  daily  occurrence 

—  was  advancing  towards  St.  Peter's.  To  our  utter 
consternation  the  driver  lashed  his  horses  and  drove 
right  into  them.  The  line  was  already  bx-eaking 
when  the  ofRcer  shouted  a  "  halt,"  and  as  loudly  de- 
livered a  "  sacr^,"  responded  to  with  a  loud  laugh  by 
our  driver.  No  doubt  the  latter  was  presuming  on 
the  nationality,  and  perhaps  the  sex,  of  his  freight. 

At  Caen  I  witnessed  the  slovenly  performance  of 
a  solemn  rite,  for  which  the  military,  not  the  clergy, 
were  answerable.  Noticing  before  a  house  in  a  poor 
quarter  of  the  town  the  usual  indications  of  a  funeral 

—  the  black  curtain,  the  mutes,  the  table,  and  the 
plate  —  with  a  soldier  or  two  standing  by,  I  resolved 
to  see  it  out.  A  company  of  soldiers,  about  twenty, 
made  their  appearance,  and  the  funeral  began.  I  fol- 
lowed to  the  cemetery.   At  the  end  of  a  short  service 


ROMAN  CATHOLIC  WORSHIP. 


327 


tlie  soldiers  fired,  that  is  they  were  to  fire,  three  vol- 
leys. Not  half  of  the  pieces  went  off.  The  mute 
guns  wore  tried  again  and  again,  with  variable  suc- 
cess, and  the  flint  and  steel  again  and  again  adjusted, 
with  some  violence  as  it  seemed  to  me.  They  were 
so  long  about  it  that  I  gave  it  up,  and  walked  into 
the  country.  Returning  the  same  way  I  found  five 
or  six  of  the  soldiers  still  making  vain  attempts  to 
discharge  their  pieces,  the  orders  being  that  every- 
one must  do  it  three  times.  Were  these  some  of 
the  guns  that  the  English  Government  sent  Louis 
Philippe  out  of  the  old  stock  in  the  Tower  of 
London  ? 


CHAPTER  CXVIII. 

TWO  SIDES  OF  THE  QUESTION. 

Some  of  my  readers  will  liave  begun  to  ask,  pages 
back,  how  I  could  Lave  patience  with  all  this  non- 
sense. Why  did  I  not  run  out  of  these  idol  temples, 
and  never  enter  them  again?  What  was  my  religion 
worth,  if  it  did  not  instantly  reject  such  utter  folly  ? 
That,  however,  was  not  my  present  mood  ;  indeed  it 
had  not  been  my  mood  now  for  many  years  ;  and 
though  I  may  now  reject  things  more  quickly  and 
more  thoroughly  than  I  once  did,  still  I  can  try  all 
things,  or  at  least  many  things  ;  and  I  possess  some 
powers  of  assimilation.  I  will,  too,  ask  the  reader  to 
take  into  account  that  I  had  long  been  engaged  upon 
the  grand  argument,  and  upon  the  princijjles  that 
necessarily  involve  details  and  reduce  them  to  minor 
account.  The  greater  questions  were  those  of  Catho- 
licity, unity,  antiquity,  primitive  practice.  Apostolic 
sanction,  the  supremacy  of  the  See  of  St.  Peter,  the 
authority  of  Councils,  the  testimony  of  Fathers  and 
Doctors  of  the  Church,  and,  comprehending  all  these 
questions,  the  just  inference  to  be  drawn  from  the 
concurrence  of  many  myriads  of  good,  wise,  and 
learned  men  in  these  very  practices.  There  is  some 
excuse  for  my  not  instantly,  then  and  there,  abomi- 
nating and  execrating  what  all  Christians  —  for  in 
the  matter  of  customs  there  is  not  much  to  choose 
between  the  East  and  tlie  West  —  had  done  for  a 
thousand  years  before  the  Reformation. 


TWO  SIDES  OF  THE  QUESTION. 


329 


I  had  come  to  believe,  nay  I  still  believe,  indeed 
all  believe,  in  the  indifferency  of  customs,  so  long  as 
they  do  not  make  void  the  Divine  word,  whether  of 
truth  or  of  command.  We  have  no  choice  but  to 
make  light  of  customs  not  absolutely  incompatible 
with  faith,  hope,  and  charity.  We  know  hardly  any- 
thing about  the  religious  practices  of  the  first  Chris- 
tians ;  and  what  we  do  know,  or  have  some  inkling 
of,  was  very  different  from  the  religious  practice  of 
any  Christian  community  of  these  days. 

We  have  to  interpret  freely  the  promise  that  the 
hour  Cometh  and  now  is  when  the  true  worshipper 
shall  worship  the  Father  in  spirit  and  in  truth.  Does 
it  exclude  any  who  so  worship  Him,  yet  retain  the 
traditions  of  olden  time  ?  There  is  no  body  of  Chris- 
tians that  has  not  reason  to  ask  for  a  charitable 
construction. 

The  charge  most  commonly  brought  against  all 
these  customs  is  that  they  are  superstitious,  foolish, 
trifling,  and  ridiculous,  unworthy  of  a  man  of  sense. 
But  which  is  the  weightier  matter  of  the  law  —  a 
protest  against  such  alleged  trifles  and  nonentities,  or 
—  the  bond  of  peace  ?  Grant  that  these  trifles  ai'e 
a  thicket  and  hiding-place  for  all  sorts  of  scandals, 
what  scandal  can  be  greater  than  that  two  neighbor- 
ing nations,  of  kindred  race,  and  with  many  common 
interests,  should  have  no  communion  in  Christ?  A 
scandal,  indeed,  there  is  greater,  and  that  is  that  the 
people  of  these  isles,  speaking  generally  one  lan- 
guage, and  under  the  same  rule,  are  divided  into 
countless  communions,  reprobating  and  excluding  one 
another. 

With  whom  lies  the  responsibility  ?  Who  began 
the  quarrel,  and  thus  divided  Christ  ?    Nay,  England 


330 


REMINISCENCES. 


has  never  had  the  courage  to  give  back  as  much  as 
she  has  had  to  take ;  for  while  her  own  Orders  are 
nothing  in  the  eyes  of  Rome,  she  respects  Roman 
Catholic  Orders  as  the  foundation  and  channel  of  her 
own.  Whether  we  look  to  ourselves  or  to  those  about 
us  and  amongst  us,  to  Christians  abroad  or  at  home, 
not  of  our  own  communion,  we  have  to  bear  all 
things,  it  may  be  said,  and  to  ask  mutual  forbear- 
ance. 

In  the  abstract,  and  without  prejudice,  what  is  to 
be  said  of  a  Church  professedly  claiming  the  alle- 
giance of  millions,  who  in  fact  have  nothing  to  do 
with  it,  and  who  live  in  irreligion  or  dissent  ?  What 
is  to  be  said  of  a  Church  whose  professed  members 
have,  for  the  most  part,  no  other  visible  observance 
but  to  jDut  on  their  best  clothes  and  sit  for  an  hour 
and  a  half  once  a  week  hearing  oratorical  prayers, 
choir  music,  and  a  well-written  discourse.  No  Ang- 
lican layman  or  divine  was  ever  so  wildly  enthusi- 
astic for  his  church  as  to  set  it  up  as  a  model  for 
general  imitation.  The  men  who  composed  or  com- 
])iled  the  English  ritual  cannot  possibly  have  had 
the  least  inkling  of  the  future  of  the  British  Empire. 
Even  the  double-minded  son  of  Beor,  even  the  Pagan 
sibyls,  priests,  and  poets,  had  more  of  the  prophet  in 
them.  When  rivalry,  or  a  wish  to  keep  up  appear- 
ances, or  some  vague  idea  of  duty,  compels  the  Ang- 
lican Church  to  offer  its  peculiar  form  of  the  Gospel 
to  the  large  section  of  the  heathen  world  included  in 
a  common  political  bond,  it  has  nothing  to  bestow 
on  them  as  the  means  of  their  conversion  and  their 
spiritual  sustenance  but  that  which  the  vast  majority 
of  its  fellow-citizens  at  home  will  have  nothing  to  do 
with,  and  abominate  from  one  quarter  or  another  of 
the  theological  compass. 


TWO  SIDES  TO  THE  QUESTION. 


331 


It  may  be  easy  to  repel  the  question  altogether 
and  refuse  to  hold  an  argument,  either  in  the  seci-et 
council  of  one's  own  mind,  or  with  any  one  so  weak 
or  SQ  bad  as  not  to  hold  everything  that  we  do  our- 
selves. Wlien  the  argument  is  once  opened,  and  it 
is  understood  that  both  sides  are  to  be  Iieard,  then 
we  soon  find  ourselves  having  to  choose  between  two 
conclusions,  neither  of  which  is  quite  as  we  shoidd 
wish  it  to  be.  We  may  object  to  confession,  abso- 
lution, and  penance  in  the  Roman  form,  but  we  can- 
not weigh  against  it  a  few  fleeting  words  and  an  im- 
palpable shade.  We  may  say,  if  we  please,  that  the 
ideas  of  relative  holiness  and  continual  purification  in 
the  Roman  system  are  Jewish,  materialistic,  or  what- 
ever wit  may  suggest  ;  but  yet  we  can  hardly  feel 
that  to  be  the  whole  of  Christian  sanctification  which 
is  confined  in  space  to  a  building  and  the  ground  it 
stands  on  ;  in  time  to  one  day  in  seven  ;  and  in  the 
spiritual  world  to  ourselves  and  a  few  select  acquaint- 
ances. 

We  may  dislike  and  be  unable  to  understand  pui"- 
gatory,  and  the  practices  associated  with  it,  but  we 
cannot  certainly  banish  purgatory  from  our  system 
without  passing  the  pen  through  a  good  many  texts, 
and  whole  passages.  Even  then,  if  we  have  a  con- 
science, we  shall  be  haunted  by  the  thought  of  a 
reckoning  running  up  between  ourselves  and  the 
Omniscient  who  rewardetli  all  men  according  to 
their  works.  We  may  believe,  if  we  have  that  con- 
ceit of  ourselves,  that  we  are  truly  sanctified,  and 
need  no  ceremonial  purifications,  but  we  can  never  re- 
member without  some  misgiving  that  none  but  the 
pure  in  heart  will  ever  see  God. 

When  we  come  to  the  great  doctrines  which  are 


332 


REMINISCENCES. 


the  very  hinges  of  the  Roman  system,  Roman  bap- 
tism and  communion,  we  have  to  start  with  the  ad- 
mission that  we  have  two  distinct  doctrines  among 
ourselves  ;  unless  indeed  our  domestic  animosities 
come  to  the  aid  of  our  insular  pretensions,  and  we 
shut  out  of  the  account  our  own  most  learned  school 
of  divines,  and  the  best  men  of  our  acquaintance. 
We  may,  if  we  please,  read  and  even  write  works  as 
pleasant  as  a  popular  tale,  to  show  that  regeneration 
means  nothing  more  than  moral  goodness  ;  but  we 
cannot  prevent  the  words  "  this  child  is  regenerated  " 
from  blazing  high  in  theolog}^,  confronting  us  in  the 
Prayer  Book,  and  lying  deep  in  the  hearts  of  our 
simple  working  poor. 

The  words,  with  their  apparent  significance,  re- 
main unaltered  by  time.  I  m«st  have  heard  from 
my  youth  many  hundreds  of  sermons  blared  against 
them,  but  they  stand,  and  the  only  result  of  these 
attacks  has  been  to  drive  the  people  into  dissent, 
where  they  are  allowed  to  believe  what  they  read, 
and  to  think  there  is  something  in  the  Chi-istian  pro- 
fession. They  who  believed  there  was  any  doctrine 
at  all  in  bajitism  heard  their  sentences  as  long  as 
I  can  remember  from  some  thousand  pulpits  in  the 
land.  They  were  Papists  already  at  heart,  and  the 
best  they  could  do  was  to  go  over  to  Rome  and  sail 
under  true  colors.  Yet  what  was  the  wonderful  sight 
that  the  Baptist  testified  to  ?  Was  it  only  an  in- 
structive show  ?  Had  it  only  a  future  significance? 
If  it  is  inconceivable  there  should  be  a  spiritual 
change  in  a  new-boi-n  babe,  is  it  less  so  that  there 
should  be  one  in  the  Eternal  and  only-begotten  Son 
of  God,  baptized  in  the  thirtieth  year  of  His  humilia- 
tion ? 


TWO  SIDES  TO  THE  QUESTION. 


333 


I  recognize  material  things  and  spiritual  things  ; 
the  immutable  laws  of  nature,  the  moral  government 
of  God,  and  the  kingdom  of  grace.  Where  they 
begin  and  end  I  know  not.  I  cannot  say  of  matter 
that  it  is,  and  of  spirit  that  it  is  not.  I  do  not  be- 
lieve that  the  soul  of  man  grows  and  develops  only 
by  human  will  and  circumstances.  I  feel  a  mystery 
everywhere,  and  mastei-ed  by  it  I  cannot  say  that 
there  is  no  more  in  baptismal  regeneration  than  fools 
and  philosophers  may  be  ready  to  allow. 

Even  the  material  forces  wielded  by  the  Omnip- 
otent utterly  transcend  our  powers  of  analysis  or 
detection.  Every  bar  on  the  solar  spectroscope  in- 
dicatf'S  an  influence  coming  direct  fi'om  the  sun,  and, 
on  a  fair  presumption,  doing  its  work  amongst  us. 
More  than  twenty  years  ago,  six  thousand  had  been 
ascertained  and  described.  Grant  that  science  in 
another  century  may  tell  the  functions  of  a  tenth  of 
them,  it  is  quite  as  likely  that  by  that  time  our  ob- 
servers will  have  ascertained  six  thousand  more  bars, 
many  of  them  not  coming  under  the  evidence  of  the 
.senses,  not  to  be  seen  or  felt,  but  discoverable  only  in 
their  chemical  or  other  relations.  Is  this  to  suggest 
a  material  hypothesis  for  baptismal  regeneration  ? 
No.  It  is  not.  It  is  to  suggest  that  when  matter 
itself  is  so  utterly  beyond  human  comprehension,  we 
may  as  well  speak  more  modestly  of  that  which  we 
believe  to  be  not  matter,  but  God. 


CHAPTER  CXIX. 


THE  SACRAMENTAL  THEOBIES. 

The  dogma,  or  definition,  of  Transubstantiation 
has  been  universally  selected  as  the  one  sufficient  and 
insuperable  obstacle  to  communion  with  Rome.  From 
very  early  years  I  had  heard  that  Roman  Catholics 
made  their  god  ;  that  they  worshipped  a  wafer,  and 
bowed  down  to  that  which  they  had  kneaded  and 
baked,  and  which  they  shut  up  in  a  box,  and  carried 
to  and  fro.  But  the  people  who  most  abhorred  the 
mass  did  not  like  our  own  Communion  Service  either. 
They  would  have  preferred  sitting  to  kneeling,  tables 
to  a  rail,  and  the  linen  cloth  laid  before  the  communi- 
cants. To  the  words  of  the  Service  they  objected, 
not  that  any  force  was  put  upon  their  own  convic- 
tions, but  that  no  force  was  put  upon  convictions  dif- 
ferent from  their  own.  The  Service  admitted  of 
various  understandings  of  it,  more  or  less  mysterious, 
from  Transubstantiation  to  the  Eucharistic  Sacrifice 
and  the  Real  Presence  of  Anglican  High  Church, 
They  held  themselves  that  it  was  no  more  than  a 
commemorative,  instructive,  and  edifying  rite.  The 
service  is  so  considerately  and  cautiously  composed 
that  it  is  hard  to  see  who  the  composers  were  favor- 
ing in  their  own  hearts.  It  is  a  pity  that  tliis  neu- 
trality has  been  at  the  cost  of  so  many  words,  partic- 
ularly when  brevity,  or  rather  no  words  at  all,  would 
have  been  becter.    As  a  fact,  "  high  "  and  "low" 


THE  SACRAMENTAL  THEORIES. 


335 


meet  on  equal  terms  at  the  Auglican  altar  or  table, 
whatever  it  is  to  be  called.  English  ideals  are  gen- 
erally practical,  for  in  this  island  at  least  we  are 
averse  to  mutual  extermination. 

The  operation  of  the  Body  and  Blood  of  our  Lord 
on  the  body  of  the  recipient  is  declared  in  the  words 
of  administration  and  in  the  Praj^er  before  the  Con- 
secration, though  some  emphatic  passages  to  the 
same  effect  in  the  Service  of  the  Mass  are  omitted. 
The  Exhortation,  now  passing  out  of  use,  certainly 
suggests  that  while  the  elements,  properly  received, 
are  medicine  to  body  and  soul,  they  are  in  effect  poi- 
son to  those  that  j^artake  of  them  unworthily  and  un- 
preparedly. 

Whether  in  boyhood  or  in  manhood,  whether  in 
the  stage  of  unconscious  or  careless  acceptance,  or  of 
enforced  investigation,  I  had  always  inclined  to  the 
"  high  "  view,  though  tolerant  of  the  "  low  "  view,  if 
its  holders  would  only  leave  me  alone.  The  truth 
was  that  when  I  came  to  consider  what  people  said 
and  did  in  this  matter,  I  arrived  at  the  conclusion 
that  no  two  people  exactly  agreed  upon  it,  but  that 
each  had  his  own  interpretation. 

It  had  long  appeared  to  me  that  our  Blessed  Lord 
Himself,  in  mercy  to  the  great  variety  of  human  un- 
derstandings, had  used  words  allowing  of  a  very 
great  latitude.  They  who  can  only  regard  the  feast 
as  a  remembrance  are  welcome  to  that  board,  so  too 
they  who  conceive  it  to  be  very  much  more. 

They  who  believe  in  a  Divine  Creation  must  be- 
lieve that  all  the  laws  of  matter  are  the  commands 
of  God,  and  that,  so  far,  there  is  no  substantial  differ- 
ence between  the  kingdom  of  nature  and  the  kingdom 
of  grace.    Bishop  Berkeley's  opinion  of  the  non-exis- 


336 


REMINISCENCES. 


tence  of  matter,  which  Fronde  was  often  returning 
to  in  the  face  of  Dr.  Johnson's  rough  confutation,  is 
only  a  way  of  stating  what  Christians  are  bound  to 
admit  to  be  virtually  true.  The  power  is  in  the  com- 
mand, not  in  the  thing,  for  it  really  is  not  tlie  bullet 
that  kills  you,  but  the  human  will  employing  the  laws 
of  motion  and  gravitation.  Of  course  this  may  seem 
a,  refinement,  and  likely  to  mislead  when  applied  to 
Christian  ordinances.  But  in  truth  the  saying,  Mate- 
riam  superahat  opus,  pervades  all  human  affairs.  Of 
matter,  as  of  the  letter,  it  must  be  said  that  it  killeth, 
and  the  spirit  giveth  life.  Speaking  generally,  all 
opinions  as  to  the  relations  of  matter  and  spirit  are 
equally  presumptuous.  Yet  there  are  plain  moral  re- 
lations, and,  it  may  be  said,  relations  that  are  re- 
vealed. Matter,  if  indeed  it  can  be  said  to  exist  at 
all,  is  always  undergoing  mutation,  corruption,  and 
destruction.  The  Word  only  is  real  and  eternal. 
The  consecrated  bread  has  the  assurance  that  it  is  the 
Body  of  Christ,  and  the  promise  that  it  will  save  body 
and  soul.  Therein  is  its  true  substance  and  reality. 
Yet  it  requires  a  very  hardy  faith,  or  a  very  idle  and 
acquiescent  faith,  to  accept  all  the  practices  built 
upon  this  doctrine.  The  Roman  Catholics  have  their 
replies.  If  the  people  won't  communicate,  let  them 
at  least  gaze  and  adore.  If  they  won't  come  to  the 
altar,  let  the  Victim  be  carried  to  them.  If  they  will 
not  eagerly  seize  a  privilege  every  day,  let  them  be 
daily  reminded  of  it.  Let  them  be  taught  that  there 
is  a  presence,  a  power,  and  a  glory,  in  the  midst  of 
them,  and  at  their  doors. 

I  had  always  felt  perplexed  and  pained  at  the  con- 
trast between  the  practice  of  Communion  in  the 
Primitive  Church,  and  in  our  own.    In  those  early 


THE  SACRAMENTAL  THEORIES. 


337 


days  there  was  no  need  to  invite,  for  all  pressed  in, 
and  the  trouble  was  to  weed  and  sift  the  multitude. 
But  in  these  days  what  a  work  it  is  !  What  canvas- 
sing round  !  what  entreaties  !  what  urgent  and  reit- 
erated reminders  !  Yet  how  scant,  how  precarious 
the  results !  Is  our  interpretation  of  Communion 
answerable  for  this,  or  the  mode  and  manner  of  our 
Communion  ? 

I  had  long  felt,  indeed  most  people  feel,  that  our 
service  is  much  too  repulsive.  The  result  was  and  is, 
that  while  the  Catechism,  certainly  in  accordance 
with  the  Scripture,  declares  Communion  necessary  to 
salvation,  we  go  on  assuming  and  actually  pronounc- 
ing the  salvation  of  millions  who  never  communicated, 
or  having  done  so  once  or  twice,  never  did  again.  I 
had  much  desired  that  all  professing  Christians  should 
communicate  regularly  and  frequently,  and  that  for 
this  end,  communicating  should  be  rendered  less  ter- 
rible and  less  difficult ;  for  it  is  actually  difficult,  not 
to  say  impossible,  under  many  circumstances.  There 
are  invalids  and  aged  people,  who  cannot  be  even  half 
an  hour  in  a  church  without  suffering  and  inconven- 
ience, and  perhaps  annoyance  to  the  congregation. 
It  was  a  point  on  which  I  differed  from  some  friends 
who  did  not  think  it  an  objection  that  the  service 
is  long,  tedious,  repulsive,  and  minatory.  Froude  al- 
ways took  the  severest  view  of  preparation,  and  even 
performance.  The  body  must  have  its  full  share  in 
the  work.  This  view  he  once  humorously  illustrated 
in  a  suggestion  that  every  member  of  Parliament 
should  receive  a  good  whipping  before  every  sitting  of 
the  House,  to  make  him  feel  it  a  serious  business  and 
bring  down  his  self-conceit.  From  different  quarters 
was  often  heard  the  wish  that  church-people  might 

VOL.  II.  22 


338 


REMINISCENCES. 


be  attracted  to  the  table  instead  of  being  warned 
off  by  terrors  such  as  those  that  once  girt  Mount 
Sinai ;  and  that  Communion  should  be  made  less  a 
trial  of  human  endurance,  which  it  often  is.  The 
invariable  reply  to  these  wishes  had  too  much  truth 
in  it.  The  real  difficulty  is  the  general  unwillingness 
to  make  a  complete  surrender  to  the  service  of  our 
Lord.  In  this  matter,  as  I  was  merciful  to  myself  I 
was  merciful  to  others.  Practically  I  don't  believe  in 
complete  surrenders.  I  don't  believe  that  the  three 
hundred  ladies  and  gentlemen  attending  a  fashionable 
Communion  have  made  a  complete  surrender  of  them- 
selves, and  that  it  is  this  that  makes  the  difference 
between  them  and  the  whole  of  the  working  classes 
inhabiting  the  same  area,  and  more  or  less  working 
for  them.  I  might  not  object  to  a  little  more  repul- 
sion being  shown  to  those  who  come  to  the  altar,  but 
I  wish  there  was  less  of  it  towards  those  who  do  not. 

But  I  had  also  always  desired  that  communicants 
might  be  left  perfectly  free,  to  put  their  own  sense 
on  the  consecration  of  the  elements.  Each  man's 
sense  we  shall  never  get  at.  It  is  certain  that  many 
who  pi'ofess  the  "  low  "  view,  that  is  the  purely  em- 
blematic sense,  are  the  most  reverential,  and  appar- 
ently the  most  deeply  impressed  and  edified;  while  it 
is  lamentable  to  notice  how  communicants  professing 
the  "  high  "  view  can  immediately  betray,  by  their 
frivolity  or  worldliness,  how  little  hold  it  really  has 
upon  them. 

Whenever  I  attempted  to  ascertain  for  my  guid- 
ance, either  as  a  writer,  or  as  a  humble  Christian, 
with  just  a  soul  to  be  saved,  what  this  "  high  "  view 
was,  I  have  to  make  the  sad  confession  that  I  never 
succeeded.    Whether  they  were  the  friends  of  the 


THE  SACRAMENTAL  THEORIES. 


339 


"high"  view  or  its  foes,  controversialists  seemed 
equally  to  envelop  their  meaning,  if  meaning  they 
had,  in  that  haze  which  is  the  medium  of  exaggera- 
tion. The  phrase  "  real  presence  "  I  never  could  at- 
tach a  distinct  meaning  to,  nor  can  I  think  it  neces- 
sary, as  neither  the  word  nor  any  expression  corre- 
sponding to  it  can  be  found  in  the  New  Testament. 
But  the  accusation  continually  repeated  was  that  the 
"  high  "  doctrine  led  to  Transubstantiation,  and  was 
indeed  the  same  in  disguise. 

The  more  I  have  read  of  our  English  theologians, 
old  or  new,  the  more  am  I  satisfied  that  when  they 
come  to  treat  of  these  matters,  they  cease  to  know 
what  they  are  talking  about.  I  find  no  difficulty  in 
accepting  the  words  of  Scripture  ;  indeed,  who  does  ? 
what  child  does  ?  But  I  do  find  insuperable  difficulty 
in  understanding  the  strong  positive,  and  not  less 
the  strong  negative,  propositions  of  polemical  writers. 
It  is  not  because  I  can  pronounce  them  wrong,  but 
because  I  can  pronounce  nothing  at  all  upon  them. 
In  the  Church  at  least  we  have  a  common  basis.  It 
is  that  the  Sacrament  is  the  supreme  occasion  and 
mode  and  form  of  a  mysterious  communication  be- 
tween God  and  His  people.  Polemical  writers 
require  that  I  shall  say  what  this  is,  and  what  it  is 
not ;  in  other  words  that  I  shall  define  the  action 
and  being  of  the  Incomprehensible.  I  believe  that 
in  the  Sacrament  there  is  the  Father,  and  the  Son, 
and  the  Spirit,  in  the  way  proper  to  a  true  partici- 
pation. 

But  how  this  is  I  know  not,  and  feel  certain  I 
never  shall  know  in  this  world.  I  feel  certain  that 
none  know,  and  that  no  purpose  could  be  answered 
by  any  one  knowing  much  more  than  others  in  a 


340 


REMINISCENCES. 


matter  in  wtich,  indisputably,  faith,  hope,  and  char- 
ity are  infinitely  more  important  than  scientific  defi- 
nitions. 

Luther,  with  whom  I  cannot  say  I  have  over  much 
sympathy,  indeed  of  whom  I  have  very  little  knowl- 
edge, had  evidently  found  himself  in  the  like  perplex- 
ities, and  had  never  extricated  himself  from  them. 
He  maintained  with  much  zeal  and  heat,  and  much 
loss  of  popularity,  an  opinion  which  most  modern 
writers  declare  to  be  substantiallj'^,  as  they  express  it, 
the  same  as  Transubstantiation.  But  he  was  a 
scholastic  philosopher,  and  by  the  time  I  was  in 
priest's  orders,  Oxford  had  been  told  that  scholastic 
philosophy  was  at  the  bottom  of  all  our  troubles  and 
all  our  blunders.  I  was  ever  but  a  listener  at  the 
door  of  the  school  thus  denounced  and  contemned, 
without  even  a  foot  within  its  threshold ;  yet  I  can- 
not bring  myself  to  believe  that  the  succession  of 
great  men  who  formed  the  backbone  of  human 
thought,  and  of  faith  too,  for  many  centuries,  were 
quite  the  fools  which  a  school  of  modern  authors,  gen- 
erally unbelieving,  would  try  to  persuade  us. 

Since  words  fail  to  fathom  or  to  describe  the  mys- 
tery believed  to  be  hidden  in  an  apparently  simple 
rite,  and  the  outer  world  has  to  be  dealt  with,  the 
controversy  has  become  one  of  ceremonies  and  cus- 
toms. Both  at  the  altar,  and  in  the  streets,  and  in 
private  houses,  and  wherever  reverence  allows  it, 
Roman  Catholics  exhibit  the  once  consecrated  bread 
as  an  object  of  such  awe  and  worship  as  we  should 
give  to  a  Divine  Presence  suddenly  visible  amongst 
us,  if  our  self-possession  were  not  utterly  overpowered  ■ 
by  the  sight.  The  Church  of  England  disapproves 
of  these  usages  on  the  simple  ground  that  they  have 


THE  SACRAMENTAL  THEORIES. 


341 


no  direct  justification  in  Scripture  ;  and  that  such 
few  statements  as  there  are  bearing  on  the  question 
stop  very  far  short  of  any  public  or  private  worship 
to  be  given  to  the  consecrated  elements.  Yet  an 
abundance  of  writers  and  talkers  within  our  Church, 
and  still  more  out  of  it,  tell  us  we  are  really  as 
superstitious  as  Rome,  and  that  what  our  greatest 
divines  believe  is  equally  beyond  all  rational  appre- 
hension. 


CHAPTER  CXX. 


THE  TRINITY. 

The  doctrine  of  Transubstantiation,  it  has  always 
to  be  borne  in  mind,  has  ever  been  inseparably  asso- 
ciated with  that  of  the  Trinity.  The  Church  of  the 
Middle  Ages  spoke  as  awfully  and  as  definitely  of  the 
consecrated  bread  as  of  the  Son,  and  of  the  Holy 
Spirit.  The  same  controversy,  and  the  same  argu- 
ments, the  same  play  of  words,  it  may  be  said, 
touched  the  altar  in  our  midst,  and  the  throne  in  the 
Heaven  of  Heavens. 

These  schoolmen  brought  together  from  Holy  Writ 
all  that  we  may  say,  or  do,  or  think,  or  feel,  as  re- 
gards the  Blessed  Son  ;  and  all  that  we  may  say,  or 
do,  or  think,  or  feel,  as  regards  the  Holy  Spirit. 
They  then  said  :  These,  of  whom  we  may  saj'',  and  do, 
and  think,  and  feel  such  things  must  be  God.  But 
God  is  One  ;  so  these  are  Three  in  one  God.  The 
argument  is  Scriptural ;  it  is  admitted  to  be  Scrip- 
tural, and  is  necessarily  Scriptural.  Nor  would  any 
one  venture  in  these  days  to  teach  a  doctrinal  form 
of  words  on  the  simple  authority  of  the  Church. 
When  I  was  barely  eight  I  was  learning  the  Cate- 
chism, confirmed  by  "  Scripture  proofs."  An  ordi- 
narily intelligent  and  right-minded  person  will  find 
no  difficulty  in  putting  together  and  bearing  in  mind 
what  we  read  in  Scripture  of  the  Son,  and  of  the 
Spirit,  and  in  arriving  at  large,  exalted,  and  awful 


THE  TRINITY. 


343 


conceptions.  But  when  the  single-minded,  well- 
taught,  and  well-directed  Christian  has  done  his  best, 
theology  proposes  to  carry  him  at  one  huge  bound 
into  another  order  of  intelligence,  not  to  say  exist- 
ence altogether,  by  dogmatic  statements  admitted  to 
embrace" the  inconceivable  and  incomprehensible. 

Always  wisliing  to  believe  as  much  as  was  believed 
by  the  best  and  most  faithful  Christian,  yet  always 
exercising  a  reason  of  my  own,  I  have  again  and  again 
entered  on  this  great  question  with  an  ever-increasing 
wish  to  see  the  Church  contenting  itself  as  much  as 
possible  with  the  very  words  of  Scripture,  and  stop- 
ping short  of  definitions  in  matter  beyond  human 
comprehension.  I  say,  "as  much  as  possible,"  for  after 
all  the  "  very  words  "  are  themselves  partly  beyond 
our  reach,  and  partly  to  be  extricated  from  surround- 
ings of  a  local  or  temporal  character.  The  Church, 
too,  in  all  ages  has  had  to  meet  the  teaching,  and  to 
follow  up  the  arguments,  of  men  employing  their  own 
terms,  and  Imposing  upon  the  multitude  by  the  pomp 
and  the  subtlety  of  their  demonstrations. 

Jesus  Christ  is  the  Son  of  Man  and  the  Son  of  God. 
Why  are  we  not  content  with  titles  so  endearing,  so 
elevating?  Yet  people  are  not  content.  Even  the 
expression  "  God  the  Son  "  is  not  the  same  thing  as 
the  "  Son  of  God."  What  warrant  is  therefor  set 
prayers  and  hymns  addressed  to  the  Son  simply  as 
God,  frequently  without  even  a  reference  to  the 
Father?  I  know  that  many  Christians  have  been 
tortured  in  childhood,  haunted  through  life,  and  pur- 
sued to  old  age  with  such  questions  as  how  could  the 
Babe  in  Mary's  arms  be  carrying  on  the  work  of  the 
Universe  —  nay,  of  an  Infinity  beyond  our  Universe 
—  entering  into  the  hearts  of  all  men,  into  the  nature 


344 


REMINISCENCES. 


of  all  living  things,  and  into  the  secrets  of  this  solid 
globe  ?  Such  a  question  is  of  course  utterly  childish 
and  ridiculous.  But  is  the  Church  of  England  quite 
blameless  in  the  matter? 

More  than  fifty  years  ago  a  dear  friend  confided  to 
me  his  difficulties  as  to  the  Personality  of  the  Holy 
Spirit.  I  was  grieved  to  see  him  in  a  condition  which 
seemed  to  impair  his  powers  of  activity,  and  threat- 
ened to  delay  the  period  of  usefulness.  So  I  tried  to 
talk  down  his  doubts,  and  I  may  have  contributed  to 
that  result.  After  applying  as  well  as  I  could  the 
texts  ascribing  to  the  Spirit  divine  attributes  and  dis- 
tinct operations,  I  fear  my  more  general  argument 
was  that  we  were  bound  to  accept  the  teaching  of  the 
Church,  and  that  in  so  doing  we  were  in  no  danger  of 
guiltiness.  While  I  talked  in  this  strain  I  was  fixing 
a  deep  disquiet  in  my  own  mind,  which  remained, 
and  indeed  still  remains,  all  the  more  because  I  have 
never  seriously  addressed  myself  to  its  removal. 

A  thousand  times  have  I  wished,  and  then  resolved 
never  again  to  let  myself  be  plagued  with  the  wish, 
that  the  word  "  Person  "  could  be  banished  from  our 
Symbols  and  Formularies.  I  shall  shock  many  of 
my  readers  when  I  say  that  the  word  has  often  sug- 
gested to  me  that  the  evil  being  who  has  certainly 
much  to  do  in  the  affairs  of  the  Church  has  intruded 
this  word  as  the  most  effectual  difficulty  language  and 
thought  could  supply  to  the  simple  and  pi-oper  recep- 
tion of  divine  truth.  At  the  time  of  this  evil  impor- 
tation Persona  was  a  term  in  law  and  in  trade,  in  as 
familiar  use  as  the  word  "  party  "  in  our  courts  and 
exchanges.  It  is  the  old  nominative  of  Prceco,  a  herald 
or  preacher,  and  is  identical  with  the  word  "  preach- 
er," only  with  a  different  termination  and  a  different 


THE  TRINITY. 


345 


flow  of  the  liquid  and  vowel  in  the  first  syllable.  It 
was  adopted  as  the  best  equivalent  of  a  logicial  term 
in  the  Greek,  denoting  that  to  which  the  qualities 
under  discussion  might  be  applied.  If  the  object  be 
to  bring  a  stupendous  mystery  as  much  as  possible 
within  reach  of  a  mathematical  intelligence,  the  word, 
for  aught  I  know,  maybe  as  good  as  any  other.  But 
for  any  practical  purpose,  it  must  defeat  its  own  ob- 
ject. We  should  set  down  any  one  as  either  a  mad- 
man or  a  very  vulgar  jester  who  should  address  either 
Father,  Son,  or  Spirit  by  the  name  of  Person,  or 
should  so  refer  to  Him. 

I  can  only  hope  that  Heaven  in  good  time  will  send 
us  s  me  s  mple  intelligible  form,  saving  the  divine 
agency  of  Father,  Son,  and  Spirit,  and  the  divine 
Unity  also. 

Again.  I  ask  with  all  humbleness  where  the  idea 
of  Threeness  is  expressed  in  the  New  Testament  with 
a  doctrinal  sense  and  force.  Where  is  the  Triune 
God  held  up  to  be  worshipped,  loved,  and  obeyed  ? 
Where  is  He  preached  and  proclaimed  in  that  three- 
fold character  ?  We  read  "  God  is  one  ;  "  as,  too,  "  I 
and  the  Father  are  one  ; "  but  nowhere  do  we  read 
that  Three  are  one,  unless  it  be  in  a  text  long  since 
known  to  be  interpolated.  Nowhere  in  Scripture  is 
there  the  idea  of  numerical  vii'tue  or  mystic  number. 
The  number  "  seven  "  indeed  is  often  found  invested 
with  sacredness,  such  as  in  its  application  to  the  di- 
vision of  time,  and  the  gifts  of  the  Spirit ;  but  that 
is  very  different  from  the  introduction  of  number  as 
an  attribute  into  the  Supreme  Object  of  worship. 

To  me  the  whole  matter  is  most  painful  and  per- 
plexing, and  I  should  not  even  speak  as  I  now  do,  did 
not  I  feel  on  the  threshold  of  the  grave,  soon  to  ap- 
pear before  the  Throne  of  all  truth. 


346 


REMINISCENCES. 


I  may  be  censured  for  these  confessions,  but  let  me 
not  be  misunderstood,  for  I  wish  to  agree  with  our 
best  divines,  and  have  no  wish  to  be  thought  a  single 
step  on  the  way  to  Arianism. 

Is  not  that  which  I  confess  to  have  been  a  lifelong 
trouble  to  me  a  comparative  novelty  ?  The  Apostles' 
Creed  is  old.  I  can  say  it  with  all  my  heart  and  mind. 
The  Nicene  Creed  is  old.  I  can  say  it  also  with  all 
my  heart  and  mind,  though  I  may  doubt  whether 
filioque  be  the  right  expression.  But  in  neither  of 
these  Creeds,  and  certainly  not  in  Scripture,  do  we 
find  the  expression  "  God  the  Son ; "  or  "  God  the 
Holy  Ghost."  Whenever  I  pronounce  the  name  of 
God  simply  and  first,  I  mean  God  the  Father,  and  I 
cannot  help  meaning  that  if  I  am  meaning  anything. 
When,  therefore,  I  immediately  add  "  the  Son,"  or 
"  the  Holy  Ghost,"  I  am  conscious  of  a  departure  from 
the  sense  I  opened  my  mouth  with.  The  first  invoca- 
tion, namely,  that  to  "  God  the  Father,"  is  to  me  intel- 
ligible and  clear,  for  the  words  bear  finite  senses  with 
infinite  enlargement.  But,  as  the  words  stand,  and  in 
the  order  in  which  they  stand,  the  other  invocations 
are  not  to  me  intelligible.  When  I  pronounce  them 
I  feel  in  a  momentary  maze,  as  if  a  dizziness  had 
come  on  me,  or  as  if  I  had  slipped  and  were  twisted 
round.  I  have  had  to  execute  a  performance,  and  I 
have  always  done  it  ill. 

I  venture  to  ask,  When  did  this  order  of  words 
come  in  ?  The  four  invocations  in  the  Litany  are 
mediaeval  rather  than  primitive,  and  are  peculiar  to 
the  Western  Church.  But  the  old  Latin  words  there 
are  Fill  redemptor  mundi  Deus,  which  I  take  to  be 
a  very  different  way  of  speaking  from  "  O  God  the 
Son  ; "  and  Spiritus  Sancte  Deus,  which  seems  to 


THE  TRINITY. 


347 


me  very  different  from  "  God  the  Holy  Ghost."  To 
confess  the  honest  truth,  when  I  say  the  words  of  our 
invocations  with  the  least  attempt  to  understand  them, 
I  feel  balancing  myself  upon  the  finest  of  edges  be- 
tween Tritheisni  on  one  side,  and  Sabellianism,  if  I 
know  what  that  is,  on  the  other.  I  may  confidently 
say  I  feel  no  such  straitness  and  peril  in  using  the 
Latin  forms. 

In  the  French  manual  of  devotion  referred  to  above, 
compiled  by  Diipanloup  from  Bossuet,  I  find  the  in- 
vocations running :  — 

Pere  celeste,  qui  etes  Dieu,  ayez  pitie'  de  nous. 

Fils  Re'dempteur  du  monde,  qui  fitcs  Dieu,  ayez  pitie  de  nous. 

Saint-Esprit,  qui  etes  Dieu,  ayez  pitie  de  nous. 

Sainte  Triuit^,  qui  etes  un  scul  Dieu,  ayez  pitie'  de  nous. 

I  use  the  words  "•  God  the  Son "  and  "  God  the 
Holy  Ghost "  both  in  public  and  in  private.  I  have 
used  them  in  private  the  very  day  I  write  this.  I 
should  not  hesitate  to  perform  the  Marriage  Service, 
though  the  words  are  there,  the  Church  of  England 
having  taken  tliat  opportunity  of  inculcating  its  very 
"  highest,"  that  is,  its  most  unintelligible  doctrine.  I 
have  continually,  up  to  the  present  time,  used  the 
Catechism  for  children,  though  I  must  say  that  if  the 
question,  "  What  dost  thou  chiefly  learn  in  these  arti- 
cles of  thy  belief,"  could  be  put  for  the  first  time  to 
the  entire  Anglo-Saxon  race,  I  'feel  quite  sure  that  not 
one  of  them,  young  or  old,  would  return  the  second 
and  third  answers,  or  answers  even  like  unto  thein. 

The  truth  is  that  in  religious  matters  everybody 
expects  to  be  called  on  to  say  what  he  does  not 
understand ;  and  they  who  impose  the  words  evi- 
dently are  the  last  to  wish  them  to  be  intelligible. 
The  writers  of  our  Hj-mn  Books  adapt  their  theory  of 


348 


REMINISCENCES. 


the  Divine  Being  and  operations  to  the  exigencies  of 
the  metre  and  the  rhyme.  They  invoke  whatever 
they  please  and  find  convenient,  and  they  abandon 
their  theology  at  a  moment's  notice  for  the  sake  of  a 
happy  fourth  line.  The  sentences  of  a  sermon  suc- 
ceed one  another  too  rapidly  to  make  sense  strictly 
necessary.  So  religious  people  are  habituated  to  be 
random  in  their  expressions.  They  speak  in  unknown 
tongues,  for  others  to  interpret  if  they  can. 


CHAPTER  CXXL 


THE  SAINTS. 

Most  Anglicans  will  agree  that  the  one  Roman 
practice  that  I'ises  above  all  the  rest  in  the  strange 
and  startling  character  it  presents  to  their  unaccus- 
tomed eyes  is  the  worship  of  the  Virgin.  To  me  it 
was  the  greatest  difficulty,  and  what  I  could  least 
turn  round,  or  get  over,  or  smooth  away.  Walking 
as  I  was,  nay  almost  running,  towards  Rome,  I  yet 
seemed  to  find  all  my  work  begin  again  when  there 
rose  before  me  this  Queen  of  Heaven  who  seemed  to 
occupy  the  place  of  all  else  that  was  Divine  —  of 
Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Spirit —  of  Holy  Scripture,  of 
Sacraments,  and  of  the  Catholic  Church  itself.  Is  it 
possible  that  this  can  be  right  and  true  ?  Does  the 
Scripture  give  any  warrant  for  it  ?  Is  the  mother  of 
our  Lord  so  prominent  a  figure  in  the  Gospel  narra- 
tives, or  are  the  few  passages  relating  to  her  so  ex- 
plicit, so  peremptory,  and  so  tremendous  ?  When 
the  Bridegroom  had  gone,  the  mother  might  be  the 
consolation  for  His  absence.  But  does  she  emerge  in 
the  Acts,  and  shine  brighter  as  the  night  darkened 
while  the  Epistles  were  written  ?  True,  all  must  ad- 
mit the  Revelation  of  St.  John  the  Divine  to  occupy 
a  debatable  place  in  this  matter,  but  yet  most  will 
think  it  to  be  interpreted  by  comparison  with  the 
other  Scriptures  of  the  New  Testament,  especially 
those  by  the  same  writer,  and  nearest  to  it  in  time. 


350 


BEinXISCESCES. 


Of  course  most  Protestants  feel  that  hundreds  of 
worshippers  on  their  knees  before  a  gaudily  dressed 
female  figure,  nay  sometimes  before  a  perfectly  black 
and  scarcely  human  physiognomy,  traditionally  held 
to  be  an  image  of  the  Virgin,  from  some  preternatural 
source,  constitute  a  spectacle  that  they  must  recoil 
from  with  horror.  There  is  not  even  room  for  doubt 
here,  they  will  say,  and  there  can  be  no  occasion  to 
search  the  Scriptures  to  see  if  these  things  be  so. 

But  I  was  now  a  traveller  in  search  of  truth,  and 
it  was  mv  duty  to  throw  nothing  aside  till  I  had 
looked  at  it,  and  considered  what  was  to  be  said  for 
it.  In  the  first  place,  for  more  than  a  thousand  years, 
saints,  theologians,  martyrs,  the  salt  of  the  earth,  the 
men  that  had  held  fast  the  faith  and  preserved  it 
for  us,  and  that  had  continually  rescued  the  civilized 
world  from  relapsing  into  prehistoric  savagery,  had 
done  what  these  simple  folk  were  doing.  They  had 
undoubtedly  worshipped  and  invoked  the  Virgin, 
and  bound  themselves  in  special  devotion  to  her  ser- 
vice. But  for  the  place  long  held  by  the  Blessed 
Virgin  in  the  heart  and  mind  of  man,  I  should  not 
have  been  a  Fellow  of  Oriel,  for  Oriel  would  never 
have  been  :  and  I  should  not  have  gone  to  Normandy, 
nay,  I  am  very  sure  I  should  never  have  been  at  all. 
All  these  good  men,  who  so  marvellously  combined 
the  faculties  of  thought  and  belief  found  incompatible 
in  our  times,  must  have  had  something  to  say  for  the 
worship  of  the  Virgin,  and  for  her  great  exaltation  ; 
indeed,  as  it  strikes  us,  her  super-eminence. 

Let  us  handle  the  matter  in  a  rational,  cold-blooded 
manner,  not  shrinking  from  the  consequences.  "  Is 
the  Mother  of  our  Lord  now  existing  ?  "  Yes.  I  be- 
lieve that  all  fathers,  mothers,  sons,  and  daughters 


THE  SAINTS. 


351 


are  now  existing.  Nature,  speaking  generally,  has 
disposed  of  their  bodies,  so  far  as  we  can  trace  her 
work  ;  but  their  souls  remain.  So  I  read  in  Homer, 
in  Virgil,  and  in  the  New  Testament,  though  not 
quite  so  certainly  in  tlie  Old.  I  even  find  this  fond 
belief  struggling  against  counter-influences  and  phi- 
losophies in  Horace,  and  blazing  into  deification  in  the 
great  Pagan  Emjjire.  Tliis  existence  I  am  permitted 
to  believe  is  a  conscious  and  active  existence;  I  say 
not  in  all  cases,  for  many  poor  creatures  can  hardly 
be  said  to  have  a  conscious  and  active  existence  in 
this  life,  and  if  they  are  kept  like  chrysalises  for  a 
few  thousand  years  before  they  emerge  in  a  winged 
state,  it  might  conceivably  be  no  great  loss,  either  to 
themselves,  or  to  the  world  from  which  they  have 
disappeared. 

The  next  step  of  the  inquiry  is  a  larger  one,  for  it 
introduces  not  only  sentience,  but  free  will  and  moral 
government,  into  the  limbo  of  cold  shades,  as  we  deem 
them.  Is  there  indeed  a  great  cloud  of  witnesses  all 
about  us  ?  Do  our  forefathers  commune  with  our 
thoughts  in  our  own  houses?  Do  the  old  saints  assist 
at  our  worship,  our  old  statesmen  in  our  cabinets  and 
councils  ?  Do  our  long  line  of  sovereigns  still  sit  on 
thrones  over  us  ;  indeed  are  we  ourselves  but  the  vis- 
ible ranks  of  a  vast  army,  resembling  the  armies  of 
modern  warfare,  that  never  show  themselves,  but  do 
their  work  without  being  seen  ? 

It  is  very  true  that  in  the  New  Testament  there  is 
next  to  nothing  as  to  the  state  of  the  departed,  and 
their  cooperation  in  human  affairs.  It  seems  there  to 
be  regarded  as  an  accidental  or  exceptional  matter 
that  Christians  died  at  all,  so  much  was  the  mind  of 
the  Church  engrossed  in  the  speedy  coming  of  the 


352 


REMINISCENCES. 


Lord.  It  is  impossible  to  find  anything  positive  as  to 
the  state  of  the  departed  ;  equally  impossible  to  find 
anything  negative.  Is  it  a  case  in  which  natui-e  is 
left  to  take  its  course  ?  The  tendency  of  nature  has 
always  been  positive,  for  wherever  men  have  had 
proper  affections  and  high  intelligence,  they  have  al- 
most invariably  believed  the  souls  of  the  great  and 
good  to  be  interested  in  human  affairs,  accessible  to 
human  approaches,  and  potent  for  good,  indeed  occa- 
sionally for  ill.  The  epithet  of  "  fond  "  applied  by 
the  22d  Article  to  this  and  other  doctrines  can  only 
mean  that  they  are  the  teaching  of  nature. 

But  is  nature  no  authority  in  this  matter  ?  How 
often  have  I  read  touching  epitaphs,  not  only  in 
churchyards,  where  there  are  "fond  "  things  enough 
to  be  found  everywhere,  but  on  the  marble  tablets  in- 
side, expressing  the  belief  that  the  departed  wife  will 
still  aid  the  lonely  husband,  and  the  departed  daugh- 
ter still  comfort  the  parents'  weeping  eyes  I 

Thei'e  necessarily  then  arises  the  question  of  hu- 
man relations.  Will  fathers  still  be  fathers,  mothers 
still  mothers,  sons  and  daughters  still  sons  and  daugh- 
ters ?  Will  the  greater  virtues  and  faculties  and  po- 
sitions be  glorified  and  perpetuated  ?  I  had  myself 
at  this  time  ever  thought  it  must  be  so,  for  it  was 
inconceivable  that  they  should  be  suddenly  deter- 
mined like  the  compact  between  our  poor  material 
elements,  or  our  common  earthl}-^  engagements.  Are 
not  our  relations  parts  of  our  identit}',  and  how  can  a 
man  be  the  same  if  not  only  everything  about  him  and 
his  tabernacle  of  clay,  but  the  whole  matter  of  spirit- 
ual identity  is  to  be  changed,  nothing  surviving  but 
a  "  character,"  whatever  that  may  be  ? 

I  am  aware  that  what  is  called  a  vigorous  under- 


THE  SAINTS. 


353 


standing  and  a  "  masculine "  Christianity  will  on 
English  soil  reject  all  such  speculations  ;  but  I  could 
never  be  sure  they  would  not  reject  everything  be- 
yond the  range  of  the  senses.  Doubters  are  very  apt 
to  stay  just  where  they  are,  doubting  forever,  cer- 
tainly in  this  world,  possibly,  to  their  great  loss,  in 
the  next.  Believers  are  apt  to  believe  too  much,  and 
to  end  in  the  lesser  beliefs  that  undermine  the  greater 
and  neutralize  their  proper  effect.  But  they  that  are 
resolute  to  disbelieve,  whenever  they  think  they  may, 
go  on  believing  less  and  less  and  less,  till  they  believe 
nothing  at  all. 

VOL.  II.  23 


CHAPTER  CXXII. 


"  MAEIOLATRY." 

But  I  must  return  to  that  wliicli  is  the  great  rock 
of  offence,  the  one  thing  which  innumerable  Chris- 
tians not  unfavorably  disposed  to  the  Church  of  Rome 
say  they  cannot  get  over ;  the  worship  of  the  Blessed 
Virgin,  and,  as  they  add,  the  substitution  of  her  wor- 
ship for  all  other  Christianity.  Of  Scriptural  warrant, 
or  even  guiding  landmark,  they  say  there  is  hardly 
any.  Instead  thereof,  visions  and  traditions  have  had 
to  be  alleged  to  make  a  case,  that  is,  when  a  case  is 
demanded.  As  before,  I  ask  what  is  the  teaching  of 
nature,  which  I  presume  to  be  not  wholly  out  of  court 
in  this  matter?  What  became  of  the  household  of 
Nazareth,  when  death  finally  released  it  from  its 
earthly  ties  ?  For  thirty  years  was  Jesus  living  there, 
in  the  completest  obedience,  and  in  the  most  loving 
interchange  of  kindnesses,  and  even  benefits. 

It  was  a  real  and  true  companionship.  It  was  an 
actual  family.  Jesus  was  no  shadow.  He  was  not  a 
piece  of  Divine  mechanism.  He  was  not  deceiving 
Mary  and  Joseph  with  a  show  of  goodness.  He  was 
not  acting  the  part  of  a  son.  We  cannot  doubt  that 
He  loved  Mary  to  the  fulhiess  of  his  nature,  which 
was  Divine.  It  would  be  a  very  idle  refinement  to 
say  that  He  loved  her  as  man  only,  for  in  Him  the 
human  and  Divine  nature  were  united.  That  nature, 
human  and  Divine,  he  bore  with  him  to  heaven. 


"  MARIOLATRY." 


355 


But  what  is  human  nature  without  its  objects  and  be- 
longings ?  What,  indeed,  do  we  think  of  the  man 
who  has  no  sooner  risen  a  step,  than  he  begins  to  be 
ashamed  of  his  humble  relatives  ?  We  despise  him 
as  a  traitor  to  the  dignity  of  true  human  nature,  a 
hollow  counterfeit,  a  thing  formed  by  vulgar  fashion, 
the  circumstances  of  the  hour. 

The  love  of  Mary  and  of  Joseph  could  not  be  bound 
by  conditions  of  space  or  time.  We  may  think  it  a 
terrible  presumption  to  place  Mary,  and  Joseph  the 
carpenter,  whose  very  name  and  profession  were  a 
reproach  to  Jesus,  near  the  throne  of  the  universe. 
But  it  would  be  a  far  more  terrible  presumption  to 
place  them  anywhere  else.  Can  we  possibly  sup- 
pose them  to  be  laid  deep  in  the  dull  catacombs  of 
an  intermediate  state,  waiting  the  solemnity  of  the 
trumpet  call  ?  Can  we  suppose  them  somewhere, 
walking  sadly  and  pensively  in  laurel  groves  ?  Can 
we  suppose  them  enjoying  that  mere  rest  which  is  of 
all  things  the  most  wearisome  ?  Can  we  imagine 
them  relegated  for  ages  to  some  corner  of  the  uni- 
verse, out  of  sight,  and  out  of  mind  ?  Would  the  Son 
intermit  His  love,  and  stop  the  flow  of  His  affection 
for  thousands  of  years,  till  the  time  arrived  for  the 
reappearance  of  Joseph  and  Mary  in  the  innumerable 
crowd  to  be  then  gathered,  and  separated  right  and 
left  ?  In  a  word,  is  there  any  one  positive  conception 
of  the  present  state  of  Joseph  and  Mary  so  natural 
and  so  reasonable  as  tliat  they  are  now  with  Christ, 
and  where  He  is,  at  the  right  hand  of  the  Father. 
Grant  that  this  last  expression  is  only  a  way  of  stat- 
ing that  which  is  really  past  our  understanding,  there 
is  nothing  inconceivable  in  Joseph  and  Mary  being 
now  with  Jesus  of  Nazareth. 


356 


REMINISCENCES. 


It  is  true  that  all  that  we  ever  imagine  of  these 
supremel}^  favored  personages,  of  Christ,  and  of  the 
saints,  and  indeed  of  all  departed  spirits,  must  be 
under  the  correction  that  in  their  case  time  and  space 
are  no  more.  They  are  in  the  presence  of  God,  and 
that  is  all  the  account  we  can  give  of  their  habitation, 
their  ways,  and  their  mode  of  being.  But  this  leaves 
the  Love  that  never  faileth,  and  that  knows  no  dif- 
ference between  time  and  eternity,  the  finite  and  the 
infinite,  the  only  guide  of  our  speculations,  destroy- 
ing thereby  all  the  barriers  which  human  jealousy 
may  choose  to  place  between  the  Son  of  God  and  the 
daughter  of  man. 

Then  with  another  long  step  we  come  to  the  ques- 
tions, Can  Mary  hear  us?  What  can  she  do  for  us  ? 
Why  should  she  do  anything  for  us  when  Christ  is 
all-sufficient,  ready  to  hear,  and  ready  to  save?  Is 
not  this  to  make  Marj'  ubiquitous,  omniscient,  all- 
powerful,  and  Divine  ?  Such  questions  are  often 
asked  as  if  they  were  quite  conclusive,  and  as  if  no 
satisfactory  answer  were  possible.  But  the  greatest 
power  that  the  human  mind  can  conceive  stops  short 
of  the  infinite  and  the  Divine.  With  the  mechanical 
agencies  wielded  by  modern  civilization  there  is  noth- 
ing inconceivable,  or  even  difficult,  in  the  idea  of  the 
whole  human  race  being  put  in  loving  accord  and  in- 
tellectual relation  with  one  person.  Surely  the  great 
Artificer  of  the  universe,  wielding  forces  far  surpass- 
ing our  knowledge,  could  delegate  to  whomsoever  He 
will  what  He  pleases  of  His  sovei'eignty. 

It  would  only  correspond  to  the  greater  part  of  the 
work  done  here  below.  Vicarious  agency  is  the  rule 
of  human  life.  Nearly  all  mankind  find  themselves 
greatly  beholden  to  others  for  their  spiritual  comfort 


"MARIOLATRY." 


357 


and  progress.  Everybody  wants  help  of  some  sort  or 
other.  The  most  confident  and  independent  have  to 
admit,  as  regards  themselves,  that  they  are  occupying 
a  mediatorial  position,  and  that  they  are  the  ordained 
receivers  and  dispensers  of  mercy,  truth,  and  grace. 
But  whatever  is  done  on  earth  can  undoubtedly  be 
done  more  easily  as  well  as  better  in  heaven.  If  Christ 
tolerates  such  poor  rulers  and  such  poor  teachers  as 
we  find  below,  why  may  He  not  have  good  servants 
above,  doing  His  work  better  ? 

But  what  proof,  what  sign  is  there  of  all  this  ? 
some  will  say.  The  answer  is,  that  proofs  and  signs 
are  not  always  necessary,  and  certainly  are  not  al- 
ways insisted  on.  We  frequently  shape  and  color 
the  unknown  from  the  known.  What  guide  have  we 
for  the  future  except  the  past  ?  We  cannot  help 
imagining  heaven  in  some  fashion  or  other.  The 
vulgar  conception  is  rest,  freedom  from  earthly  pains 
and  cares,  singing  hymns  and  shining  bright  in  glori- 
ous apparel,  with  crowns  on  our  heads  and  palms  in 
our  hands.  Can  we  really  believe  that  to  be  the  fit 
consummation  and  meet  reward  of  a  Christian  states- 
man, theologian,  or  philosopher?  If  these  ideas  are 
founded  on  texts  addressed  to  the  common  under- 
standing, may  not  even  more  be  built  upon  such 
texts  as  that  which  describes  the  Disciples  as  gov- 
erning the  twelve  tribes  of  Israel,  and  that  which 
promises  ten  cities  to  him  that  has  done  his  duty  by 
one  ?  But  the  attempt  to  reach  the  skies  by  heap- 
ing one  idea  upon  another,  the  probable  upon  the 
probable,  the  possible  on  the  possible,  the  conceiv- 
able on  the  conceivable,  is  in  truth  heaping  Pelion  on 
Ossa. 

That  in  some  way  and  in  truth  Christ  governs  the 


358 


REMINISCENCES. 


world,  we  daily  say,  and,  it  is  to  be  hoped,  we  be- 
lieve. So  are  we  told  ;  so  has  it  been  handed  down 
to  us  ;  we  cannot  question  the  propriety,  and  we 
have  accepted  the  probability  so  long  and  so  fully 
that  it  is  easier  now  to  believe  than  not  to  believe. 
But  Englishmen  have  not  been  born  and  bred  to 
believe  in  the  Syrian  household,  the  inmates  of  the 
carpenter's  shop,  assisted  by  cousins,  brothers,  or 
neighbors,  doing  this  mighty  work  ;  the  gentle  Ma- 
tron now  as  prominent  a  figure,  -as  specially  loved 
and  as  immediately  obeyed  by  all  the  powers  of  earth 
and  lieaven,  as  when  the  Babe  sat  on  her  lap,  or  the 
Son  helped  in  the  household  offices.  Where  are  we 
to  stop,  if  indeed  it  is  wished  we  should  stop  any- 
where, when  we  read  the  title,  "  The  Mother  of  God," 
won  by  generations  of  controversy,  and  still  resolutely 
claimed  for  Mary  of  Nazareth  ? 

There  is  no  disguising  the  matter.  The  new 
Trinity  has  displaced  the  old  in  Roman  Catholic 
countries.  The  Chui'ch  of  England  has  long  consti- 
tuted itself  the  Protector  of  the  Trinity,  as  Trinita- 
rians understand  it,  and  it  fights  with  national  pug- 
nacity for  that  di'iest  and  quaintest  of  all  formulas, 
the  Athanasian  Creed ;  but  the  new  Trinity  is  most 
intelligible,  most  agreeable  to  behold,  and  most  easy 
to  approach.  Instead  of  the  rustic  worshipper  having 
to  repeat,  with  stammering  accents  and  intellect  lag- 
ging far,  far  behind,  a  long  jingling  rhapsody  playing 
on  logical  terms,  he  now  sees  his  own  dear  household 
in  its  sweetest  earthly  form,  with  its  hopes  still  to  be 
fulfilled,  all  as  it  should  be,  and  as  it  ought  to  be  for 
ever. 

Was  it  not  Mary  that  bore  the  Babe,  that  nursed 
the  Babe,  that  fed  Him,  and  that  taught  Him  to  say 


"  MARIOLATRY." 


359 


His  prayers  to  His  Heavenly  Father,  and  to  sing 
hymns  to  Him,  and  to  make  proper  obeisances,  and 
be  a  good  and  dutiful  and  very  gentle  child  ?  Was 
is  not  she  that  introduced  the  Babe  to  His  own  in- 
heritance. His  own  kingdom,  and  His  own  subjects, 
to  the  flowers,  and  the  creatures,  to  the  budding  trees 
and  the  changing  skies,  to  the  Temple,  and  to  the 
crowded  shores  of  the  Lake  of  Gennesaret  ?  Was 
it  not  she  that  taught  the  Babe  to  pity  all,  even  the 
unpitying  and  unpitiable,  showing  more  by  look 
than  by  word  what  she  felt  as  Priest  and  Levite 
passed  her  humble  door  on  their  ways  to  and  fro 
between  synagogues,  public  places,  and  well-to-do 
houses  ?  Was  not  her  house  the  early  school  of  Him 
who  was  to  be  the  Teacher  of  the  world  ?  What  is 
a  Revelation  for  if  it  is  not  to  reveal  something  in- 
telligible ?  Who  brings  a  light  in  order  to  leave  us 
still  groping  about  in  darkness,  and  falling  one  upon 
another  ? 

The  largest  and  at  the  same  time  the  dearest 
foreshadowing  of  the  Christian  future  is,  that  as  we 
believe  ourselves  to  be  now  in  Him  and  He  in  us, 
so  we  may  confidently  trust  that  wherever  He  is, 
there  we  shall  be,  and  that  this  indwelling  will  not 
be  anything  passive  or  dormant,  but  the  sharing  of 
a  mighty  work  in  our  respective  capacities.  To  no 
one  among  all  that  God  has  made  can  this  promise 
apply  so  directly  and  closely  as  to  Mary  of  Nazareth. 
Whatever  we  hope  and  believe  of  ourselves  we  must 
hope  and  believe  of  her,  and  believe  it,  too,  in  the 
sense  appertaining  only  to  her. 

Putting  together  the  argument,  if  argument  there 
be,  we  can  conceive  this  glimpse  of  heaven,  this  re- 
union of  the  family  of  Nazareth.    It  is  probable,  and 


360 


REMINISCENCES. 


it  has  as  much  Scriptural  authority  as  can  be  found 
for  any  other  doctrine. 

But  we  all  of  us  know  that  with  the  vast  majority 
of  mankind  there  is  no  such  thing  as  argument,  and 
there  can  be  no  such  thing.  They  walk  in  the  lines 
of  habit,  custom,  and  tradition,  doing  as  those  before 
them  did,  and  those  around  are  still  doing.  The 
wise  tell  us  this  is  generally  the  best  thing  people  can 
do,  for,  resting  upon  custom,  when  the  custom  is 
gone  and  the  habit  interrupted,  they  know  not  what 
to  do  or  think,  and  become  nothing  at  all.  In  these 
days,  however,  it  is  not  everybody  tluit  is  permitted 
to  live  that  life  of  unthinking  and  unconscious  duty 
and  observance,  which  even  George  Herbert  pined 
for,  but  could  not  obtain.  We  are  not  all  allowed  to 
graze  in  sweet  pastures,  to  quench  our  thirst  at  the 
pure  stream,  or  to  be  as  trees  waving  their  foliage 
in  the  soft  western  breeze.  We  find  ourselves  com- 
pelled to  defend  our  own  beliefs,  and  to  attack  as 
well  as  defend. 

What,  then,  becomes  our  rule,  that  is,  our  actual 
rule  ?  The  answer  is  easy,  too  easy  indeed.  The 
generation  of  belief  is  soon  told.  It  is  the  child  of 
will.  People  believe  what  they  wish  to  believe,  and 
they  wish  to  believe  that  which  suits  their  interests, 
their  tastes,  or  their  prejudices.  Other  views,  other 
arguments,  may  be  implanted  in  them  to-day,  but 
only  to  be  found  dead  to-morrow.  Whatever  finds  its 
way  into  them  requires  food,  and  if  the  food  be  not 
there,  the  ungenial  aud  really  unwelcome  intruder 
dies  for  lack  of  it.  Faith  is  a  living,  and  therefore  a 
dying  thing.  It  is  not  a  stone  cut  to  shape,  insoluble, 
imperishable,  and  holding  its  ground  because  indi- 
gestible.   It  must  grow  and  develop,  or  disappear; 


"  MARIOLATRY." 


361 


and  its  growth  must  be  by  the  accretion  of  kindred 
elements. 

People  do  not  like  to  be  told  they  believe  what 
they  wish  to  believe,  and  what  suits  their  temper  or 
their  cards,  but  they  are  nevertheless  often  angry 
at  the  beliefs  of  those  about  them,  and  such  anger 
recognizes  the  prevalence  of  will  and  the  suprem- 
acy of  the  moral  nature  in  the  decision  of  religious 
questions.  We  are  not  angry  with  the  man  who  is 
simply  a  member  of  some  unchangeable  order,  one 
herring  in  a  shoal,  one  worm  in  a  coral  reef,  one  leaf 
on  a  tree.  We  are  angry  with  the  man  who  appears 
to  have  a  will  and  a  taste,  and  whose  will  and  taste 
clash  with  our  own  will  and  our  taste. 

That  belief  is  a  matter  of  taste  and  of  will  appears 
on  the  face  of  history,  and  in  no  historical  records 
more  plainly  than  our  own.  There  we  find  argu- 
ments, authorities,  records,  texts,  becoming  at  once 
as  the  chaff  of  the  floor  or  the  dust  of  the  earth  before 
the  strong  will  of  a  man,  or  a  woman,  bending  the 
nation  to  her  own  fancies  or  her  own  purposes.  As  a 
rule  the  English  parent  assumes  that  nothing  in  the 
head  or  in  the  heart  of  the  child  ought  to  prevail,  in 
the  matter  of  religious  belief,  against  the  parental 
authority.  The  parent  insists  on  the  child  adopting 
the  hereditary  belief,  and  would  seldom  condescend 
to  argument  as  having  any  place  in  the  question. 
What  is  this  but  to  admit  that  all  arguments,  all 
authorities,  all  Scriptural  proofs  and  analogies,  are 
but  material  to  be  played  with  in  sight  of  a  foregone 
conclusion?  But  foregone  conclusions  have  their  day. 
They  betray  the  violence  of  will.  They  provoke 
counter  obstinacies.  They  who  have  been  compelled 
for  years  to  believe  or  not  believe,  to  reason  or  not 


362 


EEMINISCENCES. 


to  reason,  at  the  word  of  command,  find  themselves 
one  day  their  own  masters,  and  though  they  may 
repeat  the  tyranny  they  resent,  and  dictate  as  impe- 
riously as  their  fathers  did  before  them,  it  will  gen- 
erally be  in  a  somewhat  different  direction. 


CHAPTER  CXXIII. 


ROMISH  INVENTIONS. 

But  what  healthy  taste,  and  what  will  that  is 
not  rathei"  wilfulness  than  free  will,  can  accept  the 
enormous  lies,  fables,  pretended  miracles,  and  alleged 
revelations  of  the  Church  of  Rome  ?  Such  is  the  in- 
dignant cry  of  Protestant  writers,  who  seem  to  have 
discovered  for  the  first  time  the  large  part  played 
by  the  imagination  in  human  affairs  when  they  hear 
this  or  that  marvellous  Church  story. 

It  is  a  comfort  to  be  assured  by  these  bursts  of 
outraged  reason,  that  the  sense,  or  at  least  the-  pro- 
fession, of  truth  survives,  and  is  not  afraid  to  declare 
itself.  Yet  any  one  who  knows  anything  of  human 
affairs  must  be  aware  that  lying  performs  a  large,  and 
not  wholly  injurious  or  discreditable  part  in  them. 
The  same  Almighty  who  has  created  us  without  a 
window  in  our  foreheads  or  in  our  breasts,  and  who 
has  given  every  one  of  us  a  council  chamber  for  the 
management  of  our  little  affairs  of  state,  has  also 
ordained  an  infinite  number  of  circumstances,  the 
whole  truth  of  which  it  is  unnecessary  to  bestow  on 
the  world.  With  regard  to  all  these  matters,  it  is 
held  to  be  sufficient  to  give  the  world  just  as  much  as 
it  has  a  right  to  ask,  and  no  more.  If  upon  finding 
his  natural  defences  suddenly  forced,  a  man  happens, 
from  an  unreadiness,  to  say  that  which  is  not  literally 
true,  he  throws  the  blame  on  those  that  practised  on 
his  weakness  or  his  simplicity. 


364 


REMINISCENCES. 


But  it  is  quite  impossible  to  communicate  the  real 
state  of  things,  in  any  matter  of  religion,  morality,  or 
politics  without  an  intermixture  of  error.  We  may 
flatter  ourselves  that  the  utterance  proceeds  from  us 
without  distortion  or  alloy,  but  it  has  to  pass  through 
other  media,  and  receive  their  refraction  or  their  hue. 

But  will  this  account  for  the  enormous  circumstan- 
tial inventions  and  forgeries  of  Rome  ?  Grant  that 
it  will  not.  Grant  that  some  of  these  inventions  — 
to  be  content  with  one  of  them,  the  Assumption  of 
the  Blessed  Virgin  —  is  simply  a  forgery  and.  nothing 
more,  let  us  consider  what  these  inventions  come  to. 

As  a  rule  inventions  are  made,  or  adopted,  in  con- 
firmation or  illustration  of  existing  probabilities.  A 
fable  is  a  fictitious  representation  of  a  truth,  and  the 
more  popular,  the  more  ancient,  and  the  more  wide- 
spread the  fable,  the  more  strongly  does  it  testify  to 
the  universality  of  the  truth.  Baseless  itself,  a  pure 
invention  indeed,  and  utterly  incredible,  it  fills  the 
imagination  with  a  scene,  and  the  mind  with  a  moral 
belief. 

Nobody  ever  yet  supposed  that  any  dog  had 
dropped  a  bit  of  meat  while  snapping  at  its  shadow, 
or  that  any  lion  had  ever  invited  an  ass  to  share  his 
sport  and  divide  the  game*  or  that  any  porcupine  had 
ever  sought  refuge  from  a  shower  in  a  snake's  hole 
and  their  declined  to  quit  it,  or  that  any  tortoise  had 
run  a  race  with  a  hare  and  won  ;  but  these  stories 
were  both  picturesque,  and  they  also  illustrated  what 
frequently  occurred  in  human  life.  Every  attempt 
to  teach  the  ways  of  human  life  with  real  and  prac- 
tical illustration  labors  under  great  disadvantages, 
as  must  be  immediately  apparent  to  any  one  who 
makes  it. 


ROMISH  INVENTIONS. 


365 


This,  of  course,  is  specially  the  case  in  dealing 
■with  the  young  and  the  uninformed.  They  cannot 
take  in  the  ideas  or  the  facts  of  real  life  ;  they  cannot 
follow  moral  consequences  or  estimate  moral  proba- 
bilities. They  will  dispute  every  allegation,  and  in- 
sist on  reducing  all  human  affairs  to  their  own  imper- 
fect reflex  and  puny  proportions.  They  as  quickly 
reject  the  details  necessary  to  establish  any  case,  and 
are  then  worse  than  they  were  before,  for  they  have 
triumphed  over  truth,  and  made  facts  contemptible. 
But  if  you  tell  them  of  all  the  beasts  once  choosing  an 
ape  for  their  king,  or  of  all  the  trees  of  the  forest  elect- 
ing a  bramble  bush,  or  if  you  tell  them  of  a  fox  and 
a  crane  exchanging  hospitalities,  and  the  former  put- 
ting his  fare  in  a  plate,  and  the  latter  into  a  long- 
necked  pitcher,  you  make  no  demands  on  their  faith 
or  their  experience,  but  you  leave  a  highly  suggestive 
and  indelible  picture,  which  may  be  said  to  be  sub- 
stantially true. 

The  prevalence  of  such  fables  does  not  in  the 
slightest  degree  militate  against  the  probability  of  the 
moral  truths  represented  ;  on  the  contrary  it  testifies 
thereto.  Nobody  could  ever  say  he  was  certain  there 
were  no  people  capable  of  "  blowing  hot  and  cold," 
because  he  was  certain  that  no  satyr  had  ever  kicked 
out  a  traveller  who  seemed  to  do  so ;  indeed  that 
there  never  was  such  a  being  as  a  satyr. 

Bunyan  palmed  a  prodigious  revelation  on  the 
Christian  world.  But  he  disarmed  criticism  by  the 
candid  avowal  that  it  was  a  lie  from  beginning  to 
end,  so  far  as  all  the  particulars  were  concerned.  Yet 
his  wonderful  power  enabled  him  to  give  this  fiction 
all  the  force  of  truth,  and  it  is  frequently  said  that 
the  "  Pilgrim's  Progress"  and  "  Paradise  Lost"  have 


366 


REMINISCENCES. 


done  more  to  form  the  religious  faitli  of  this  country 
than  the  Bible. 

In  the  course  of  a  controversy  raging  within  and 
without  on  every  point  of  the  Christian  faith,  and 
making  a  continual  defence  against  injurious  objec- 
tions, the  Church  arrived  at  various  beliefs,  amongst 
them  the  exaltation  of  the  family  of  Nazareth  to  the 
court  of  heaven,  and  the  restoration  of  the  desolate 
Mother  to  her  true  Son.  Filling  up  first  one  void, 
then  another,  in  the  vast  conception,  it  imagined  such 
a  Mother  as  such  a  Son  would  have,  the  almost  neces- 
sary companion  of  His  glorified  humanity.  This 
might  be  incr(?dible,  but  it  is  not  inconceivable,  that 
is  if  we  are  at  liberty  to  conceive  anything  at  all  of 
what  is,  and  what  passes  in  heaven.  It  is  as  con- 
ceivable, for  example,  as  anything  in  the  Revelation 
of  John  the  Divine.  It  is  far  more  conceivable  than 
what  Milton  tells  us  of  the  conversations  in  heaven. 

But  there  were  still  more  voids  to  be  filled,  each 
successive  supplement  drawing  still  more  boldly  on 
the  stock  of  probability.  How  did  Mary  pass  through 
the  grave  and  gate  of  death,  and  how  did  she  rise  to 
heaven  ?  It  could  not  be  as  a  common  mortal.  She 
who,  for  aught  we  read,  had  never  left  her  Son,  but 
for  some  brief  absences,  from  the  cradle  to  the  Cross, 
must,  like  Him,  rise  in  glorified  humanity  to  His 
throne  in  heaven. 

Hence  the  story  of  the  Assumption.  The  belief 
was  never  founded  on  that  story.  The  story  was 
founded  on  the  belief,  and  testifies  to  the  fact  of  that 
belief.  The  belief  which  was  universal  required  a 
defined  shape,  and  that  shape  at  length  it  found.  It 
was,  then,  equally  probable,  but  equally  wanting  cir- 
cumstantial record  and  doctrinal  form,  that  this  per- 


ROMISH  INVENTIONS. 


367 


sonage,  all  but  Divine,  if  indeed  not  Divine,  should 
have  liei-  sluire  in  the  Divine  government,  and  Jiave 
rights  of  worship.  The  saints  already  had  this  on  a 
lesser  scale.  There  must  be  testimony  and  particu- 
lars for  this. 

Hence  the  thousands  of  legends  of  the  Blessed 
Virgin's  appearance  and  interposition.  It  was  a  com- 
mon belief,  taking  various  local  forms.  The  im- 
mense variety,  and  almost  evidently  fictitious  charac- 
ter of  those  legends,  only  testify  to  a  belief  which  in 
itself  is  scarcely  less  conceivable  than  the  universal 
reign  of  the  risen  Saviour,  and  only  less  probable.  Of 
those  professing  Christians  who  utterly  reject  the  one 
belief,  a  very  large  proportion  as  utterly  reject  the 
other.  But  no  amount  of  error,  of  imposture,  of  ab- 
solute nonsense,  can  affect  the  probabilities  upon 
which  both  are  founded. 

Truth  and  goodness  always  will  be  preyed  on  and 
counterfeited.  But  even  if  the  representation  of  a 
truth  be  false  in  its  particulars,  it  may  not  be  mate- 
rially and  substantially  false.  We  tolerate  too  readily 
much  substantial  untruth.  We  tolerate  historians  that 
give  all  the  virtues  to  one  party,  and  all  the  vices  to 
the  other.  We  tolerate  one-sided  biographies  of 
heroes  or  saints,  who  could  have  told  us  a  very 
different  story  of  one  another.  We  have  all  our 
history  written  backwards,  in  order  to  square  it  with 
modern  ideas.  We  see  no  dishonesty  in  this.  Yet 
the  people  who  thus  invent  history  and  poison  the 
wells  of  knowledge  are  most  piously  indignant  at 
stories  that  only  pictured  old  beliefs  and  invested 
them  with  proper  circumstances. 

What,  then,  is  the  moral  to  be  drawn  from  a  gen- 
eral view  of  all  this  questionable  matter  ?    We  aro 


368 


REMINISCENCES. 


driven  back  to  the  conceivable  and  the  probable,  as 
far  as  it  runs  in  the  lines  of  Scripture  and  of  the 
Church  and  has  the  adequate  guarantee  of  general 
agreement.  But  now  comes  the  greater  question. 
This  probability  any  one  who  is  not  born  and  bred 
and  tied  and  wedded  to  a  system  has  to  measure  for 
himself ;  and,  as  I  have  said  above,  his  measure  will 
be  very  much  what  he  likes,  and  what  therefore  he 
wills. 


CHAPTER  CXXIV. 


THE  FIELD  OF  IMAGINATION. 

There  is  no  faculty  so  universal  as  that  of  conceiv- 
ing beings  out  of  our  knowledge,  and  circumstances  out 
of  our  experience.  When  the  philosopher  laid  down 
that  novelties  can  only  be  tested  by  experience,  he 
put  on  it  a  burden  it  has  always  refused  to  bear. 
The  result  is  that  there  is  no  public  propertj'  so  uni- 
versal, so  vast,  so  fertile,  so  unfailing,  as  that  region 
of  fancy  in  which  the  mind  creates  or  accepts  cre- 
ations. What  they  profess  to  be  signifies  little.  They 
may  have  gained  admittance  as  possible  verities,  or 
as  plausible  fictions  ;  they  may  have  claimed  to  instruct 
or  to  amuse ;  they  may  have  demanded  entrance  or 
insinuated  themselves.  Once  in,  they  hold  their 
ground  and  become  part  of  our  existence.  One  thing 
they  are  not.  They  are  not  matter-of-fact,  probable, 
reasonable  creatures.  They  are  above  human  nature, 
or  below  it,  or  beside  it  altogether.  They  are  incar- 
nations. They  occupy  the  mind  and  monopolize  it. 
We  may  say  that  they  are  inventions,  and  that  they 
are  indeed  nothing  at  all;  but  they  possess  us,  influ- 
ence us,  master  us,  and  are  our  lords.  The  historian 
is  always  hampered  with  the  difficulties  of  circum- 
stances, the  conflict  of  authorities,  and  the  obligations 
of  truth.  The  novelist,  the  poet,  or  the  dramatist 
soars  over  mundane  obstacles.  He  creates  personages, 
principalities,  and  powers,  in  the  air. 

VOL.  II.  24 


370 


KEMINISCENCES. 


The  art  of  giving  life  and  form  to  names  and  sense- 
less things  is  envied  alike  by  historians,  philosophers, 
and  naturalists.  They  are  forced  to  bring  poetry  and 
invention  to  their  aid,  investing  men  with  angelic 
natures,  brute  creatures  with  reason,  and  matter  with 
far-seeing  aspirations  and  concerted  action.  We  boast 
that  this  is  a  matter-of-fact  age,  and  that  nothing  is 
taught,  sanctioned,  or  upheld  that  cannot  be  mathe- 
matically demonstrated.  Yet  nevei"  before  did  fiction 
in  a  thousand  forms  occupy  so  large  a  part  of  the 
current  literature.  Never  before  were  inventions  of 
the  most  monstrous  and  irrational  character  a  regular 
part  of  education.  In  the  presence  of  so  great  a  fact 
we  must  assume  this  to  be  the  order  of  Providence 
and  the  constitution  of  our  nature.  We  cannot  know 
everything,  or  more  than  a  very  little.  What  we  do 
know  we  cannot  know  rightly.  We  must  see  fact 
itself  through  a  medium  of  fiction.  But  of  pure  fiction 
itself  we  can  all  take  in  a  considerable  quantity,  a 
whole  world  of  it  indeed. 

Yet  this  fiction  necessarily,  and  certainly  in  fact, 
occupies  a  rank  midway  between  earth  and  heaven, 
between  experience  and  imagination,  between  our 
sufferings  and  our  aspirations,  between  our  own  short 
tether  and  the  illimitable  range  of  higher  powers. 
Here  is  a  whole  firmament  to  be  filled  just  as  we 
choose  to  fill  it.  May  we  not  at  least  suspect  that  all 
this  is  a  lost  and  ruined  realm,  made  to  be  furnished 
with  better  stuff,  and  peopled  with  nobler  beings 
than  the  creations  of  men  avowedly  disdaining  the 
higher  in  comparison  with  the  lower  affinities  ?  It 
may  be  impossible  to  repair  the  vast  and  inveterate 
injuries  of  time.  A  true  and  wholesome  hagiology 
may  be  now  as  imoossible  as  unity  or  other  primitive 


THE  FIELD  OF  IJIAGINATION. 


371 


grace.  Yet  may  not  that  be  laraentetl,  and  may  we 
not  dwell  on  that  which  might  have  been  ?  The 
Church  of  England  has  swept  out  of  all  recollection 
fifteen  centuries  of  great,  good,  and  holy  men,  with 
all  their  works,  whatever  they  were.  What  does  it 
show  instead  ?  In  its  own  lines  it  can  show  some 
learned  and  exemplary  divines,  one  or  two  Christian 
poets,  and  a  few  ladies  of  rank  and  piety.  When  it 
wants  to  produce  a  cloud  of  witnesses,  it  has  to  look 
out  of  its  own  lines,  and  borrow  for  a  momentary  dis- 
play the  names  of  men  who  spent  their  whole  lives  in 
one  long  protest  against  it. 

When  the  Church  of  England  had  done  its  best 
to  destroy  the  traces  and  the  very  memory  of  thou- 
sands of  saints,  by  a  singular  retribution  it  became 
barren.  The  very  idea  of  the  man  or  woman  favored 
with  extraordinary  grace  and  living  a  Divine  life  is 
extinct,  except  in  forms  specially  adapted  to  our  aris- 
tocratic or  literary  preferences.  The  Wesleyans  and 
some  other  dissenters  have  a  copious  hagiology,  in 
which  the  humbler  classes  have  their  proportion  of 
numbers  and  honor.  The  Church  of  England  seems 
to  show  a  positive  jealousy  of  the  saint  "  from  the 
ranks."  Mj  Oxford  friends  very  early  noted  and 
lamented  the  void,  and  caught  eagerly  at  new  books 
that  seemed  to  offer  Christian  experiences  in  the 
humbler  class  of  life.  Wood's  "  Death-bed  Scenes 
and  Pastoral  Conversations  "  was  hailed  as  a  promis- 
ing novelty,  and  widely  recommended  to  young  clergv- 
men.  The  book  at  once  interested  and  disappointed 
me.  I  felt  it  clever  and  instructive,  but  very  uni-eal, 
as  if  out  of  the  writer's  own  head.  When  the  "  Tracts 
for  the  Times  "  were  started,  Thomas  Keble,  I  be- 
lieve it  was,  either  described  or  conjured  up  one  Rob- 


372 


REMINISCENCES. 


ert  Nelson,  a  humble  and  pious  inquirer  after  the 
Anglican  fashion.  I  am  not  in  a  condition  to  say 
how  far  he  succeeded.  Very  soon  after  there  ap- 
peared right  and  left  of  the  movement  a  vast  cloud 
of  auxiliaries  in-  still  brighter  array.  Samuel  and 
Robert  Wilberforce,  Adams,  Paget,  Gresley,  Parkin- 
son, Neale,  E.  Monro,  and  a  host  of  writers  ushered 
to  the  world  by  Mr.  Burns,  were  now  writing  for  the 
young  fictions  more  or  less  founded  on  fact.  Actual 
religious  biography  came  in  but  slowly.  Since  those 
days  I  have  occasionally  heard  of  exceptional  Chris- 
tians in  cottages  who  received  the  testimony  of  a  ser- 
mon or  a  tract.  They  emerge  and  sink  again  out  of 
notice  ;  known  for  a  time  in  a  neighborhood,  never 
at  all  in  the  country  at  large.  A  collection  of  such 
memorials  would  be  a  valuable  addition  to  our  scanty 
Anglican  records. 

Though  Newman  was  himself  one  example  amongst 
many  of  a  man  as  well  read  in  all  the  best  works  of 
imagination  as  in  those  of  history  or  philosophy,  and 
therefore  proving  the  compatibility  of  the  three, 
nevertheless  it  is  evident  that  imagination  is  always 
covering  new  ground  and  displacing  serious  thought 
and  study.  It  dominates  in  our  nurseries,  in  our 
drawing-rooms,  in  our  elementary  schools,  as  well  as 
in  our  theatres.  It  holds  its  ground  with  a  tenacity 
out  of  all  proportion  to  its  reasonable  claims.  In 
most  memories  its  characters  survive  conquerors, 
kings,  and  statesmen ;  its  most  trifling  or  impossible 
incidents  are  remembered  with  accuracy  when  revolu- 
tions and  civil  wars  are  forgotten  ;  its  moral  lessons 
are  still  recognized  amid  the  wreck  of  decalogues, 
constitutions,  and  creeds.  In  an  interval  of  sober 
reason  a  man  asks  himself  the  value  of  this  immense 


THE  FIELD  OF  IMAGINATION. 


373 


visionary  world.  He  answers  quickly  that  in  matter 
of  fact  it  is  nothing  at  all,  but  that  it  is  all  substan- 
tially true,  inasmuch  as  the  sentiment  is  genuine,  the 
moralit)'^  good,  and  the  philosophy  sound. 

Forty  years  ago  we  had  arrived  at  the  question, 
Was  the  Church  alone  to  be  shut  out  of  this  fairy- 
land ?  Was  it  not  to  be  allowed  to  dredge  in  the 
deep  sea  of  medigeval  tradition,  to  bring  up  all  that 
came  into  its  net,  for  people  to  deal  with  as  they 
please?  Here  were  the  actual  records.  They  were 
written,  it  is  true,  by  monks  who  had  to  please  their 
masters  or  their  readers.  The  tales,  novels,  and  still 
larger  class  of  books  combining  imagination  with  fact 
are  also  written  for  masters  and  readers.  The  "  Cal- 
endar "  and  "  Lives  of  the  English  Saints,"  advertised 
in  the  last  number  of  the  "  British  Critic,"  no  doubt 
contain  a  good  deal  that  is  startling  and  past  the 
powers  of  a  modern  imagination.  But  when  these 
saints  present  themselves  and  their  wonderful  stories, 
demanding  admission,  and  at  least  a  hearing,  it  can- 
not be  said  that  there  is  no  place  for  them,  or  that 
we  have  not  the  faculty  for  comprehending  such  be- 
ings, or  that  we  are  better  employed.  Of  course  it 
will  be  replied  that  between  mediaeval  legends  and 
modern  works  of  imagination  there  is  the  saving  dif- 
ference that  the  forme^r  profess  to  be  true,  the  latter 
to  be  fictitious.  Even  if  that  were  quite  ti-ue  it  would 
not  much  affect  the  comparison,  for  when  we  have 
allowed  ourselves  to  be  possessed  with  an  ideal  per- 
sonage, it  does  not  much  matter  whence  he  came  or 
what  are  his  credentials. 

The  truth  is,  even  if  we  have  made  these  idols  of 
the  imagination  with  our  own  hands  —  and  many  of 
U3  have  so  made  them  —  they  work  upon  us  as  effect- 


374 


REMINISCENCES. 


ually  as  if  they  were  real  and  living  beings ;  often  far 
more  injuriously. 

After  all,  these  legends  are  the  chief  material  left 
for  filling  up  the  enormous  gap  that  we  call  the  "  Mid- 
dle Ages."  We  possess  annals,  indeed,  still  with  the 
monkish  taint  upon  them ;  documents,  title-deeds, 
and  what  the  antiquary  can  make  out  of  heaving  turf 
and  mouldering  wall.  But  none  of  these  give  the 
life,  the  faith,  and  the  thoughts  of  the  once  mighty 
people  from  whom  we  are  descended.  Historians  de- 
spair of  rousing  interest  for  the  battles  of  kites  and 
crows.  When  Kingsley  wished  to  introduce  Saxons 
and  Normans  to  his  Modern  History  class,  he  sub- 
stituted a  tale  for  annals.  Living  historians  are 
throwing  overboard  men  and  things,  and  giving  us  in 
their  stead  the  successive  developments  of  principle 
and  the  irresistible  instincts  of  class,  position,  and 
power.  Not  only  Divine  intervention  but  the  human 
will  itself  disappears  into  the  inevitable  sequence  of 
causation. 

Maitland,  working  in  the  Lambeth  Library,  and 
Sir  F.  Palgrave,  undertook  in  their  respective  ways 
the  restitution  of  the  Middle  Ages,  and  of  monkish 
literature,  art,  and  science,  to  their  due  place  in  his- 
tory. They  would  both  probably  think  themselves 
taken  at  more  than  their  word  by  Newman's  "  Lives 
of  the  English  Saints."  This,  however,  is  an  age  of 
discovery  and  of  exhumation.  An  immense  quantity 
of  documents,  hitherto  buried  in  archives  and  muni- 
ment rooms,  in  public  and  private  collections,  have 
been  published  in  series.  The  principle  of  entire 
and  unreserved  publication  is  now  universally  ac- 
cepted. Everybody  is  to  be  allowed  to  use  his  own 
judgment  upon  the  originals.    It  would  have  been 


THE  FIELD  OF  IMAGINATION. 


375 


quite  impossible  at  this  date  (1843)  to  publish  the 
"  Lives  "  with  selection,  omission,  suppression,  or  cur- 
tailment of  any  kind. 

Though  the  publication  en  masse  was  thoroughly 
in  accordance  with  the  modern  English  usage,  and 
was  certainly  a  bold  reply  to  a  crowd  of  jesters,  yet  I 
believe  most  Roman  Catholics  of  the  old  school  would 
call  it  unnecessary.  They  concern  themselves  very 
little  about  these  legends.  They  are  not  called  on  to 
accept  everything,  nor  is  it  their  business  to  disparage 
anything.  Few  indeed  of  them  know  anything  about 
these  matters  which  so  much  trouble  Protestants. 
They  can  refer  to  a  local  tradition  or  a  quaint  per- 
sonage, much  in  the  same  tone  as  an  English  gentle- 
man would  in  giving  the  history  of  the  monastic 
founders  of  his  house  and  his  estate. 

The  English  Protestant  may  go  to  St.  Peter's 
every  day  for  a  winter  vpithout  seeing  the  least  sign 
of  a  relic  or  a  miraculous  legend.  If  he  goes  to  the 
metropolitan  church  of  St.  John  Lateran,  he  will  see 
a  nave  adorned  with  the  colossal  whi<^e  marble  stat- 
ues of  the  Apostles,  and  nothing  more.  But  his 
guide-book  will  probably  tell  him  of  wonderful  relics 
at  both  churches.  Hope  Scott  greatly  desired  to  see 
the  treasures  accumulated  in  the  "  Confession  "  — 
that  is,  the  crypt  of  St.  Peter's,  and  asked  the  Pope 
for  an  order.  Pio  Nono  told  him  he  must  go  to  the 
Dean  for  that ;  but  he  added,  "  I  have  not  seen  them 
myself." 

At  the  Lateran  the  stranger  has  been  told  of  a 
cloister  remarkable  for  its  fine  twisted  columns  of 
Alexandrine  mosaic.  Through  a  small  side-door  he 
passes  into  it  and  finds  himself  in  another  world.  A 
vast  quantity  of  relics  are  piled  against  the  walls, 


376 


REMINISCENCES. 


as  if  it  were  a  curiosity  shop,  looking  very  dirty  and 
neglected.  The  one  that  dwells  in  my  memory  is  a 
slab  perforated,  so  the  legend  is,  by  the  fall  of  the 
Host  upon  it.  I  need  not  say  that  few  Italian  or 
French  gentlemen  believe  in  legends,  but  alas !  few 
of  them  believe  anything  at  all. 


CHAPTER  CXXV. 


HOLY  WRIT. 

I  HAD  never  read  the  Bible  much  in  a  devotional 
way,  nor  cared  to  hear  it  so  read,  except  in  church, 
or  on  the  rare  occasions  of  it  being  read  exception- 
ally well.  There  is  hardly  a  chapter  which  does  not 
bring  up  a  passage  of  doubtful  significance,  and  it 
was  always  an  extreme  annoyance  to  me  to  find  my- 
self expected  to  accept  a  conventional  sense,  which 
was  sometimes  no  sense  at  all,  but  rather  an  expedi- 
ent to  evade  the  obvious  sense.  Sixty  years  ago  the 
interpretation  of  Scripture  was  one  vast  mass  of  con- 
ventionalisms, very  galling,  very  oppressive,  yet  not 
to  be  touched  as  you  would  value  your  peace  and 
character.  Should  any  one  have  the  temerity  to  ex- 
press a  doubt  whether  the  words  "  In  the  place  where 
the  tree  falleth,  there  it  shall  lie,"  were  jDoint  blank 
against  purgatory,  or  whether  the  "  works "  con- 
trasted by  St.  Paul  with  "  faith,"  included  Christian 
obedience  in  the  same  category  as  Jewish  ordinances, 
he  must  be  an  atheist,  or,  still  worse,  a  Papist  in  dis- 
guise. More  than  fifty  years  ago  I  was  with  Go- 
lightly  at  my  Lincolnshire  friend's,  Mr.  Wayland, 
whose  wife  was  very  clever  and  very  good  after  the 
fashion  of  the  time.  She  quoted  as  a  promise  of  sup- 
port in  the  hour  of  need  the  words,  "  As  thy  days,  so 
shall  thy  strength  be."  Golightly,  with  much  so- 
lemnity interposed,  "If  you  will  excuse  me,  ma'am, 


378 


REMmSCENCES. 


that  is  not  the  exact  sense  of  the  original,"  which  he 
Tvas  proceeding  to  explain.  He  was,  however,  inter- 
rupted in  return.  "  That 's  just  the  way  of  you  Ox- 
ford gentlemen.  You  are  taking  away  from  us,  one 
after  another,  all  the  texts  which  are  our  comfort  and 
our  stay,  till  we  shall  have  none  left."  I  might  not 
myself  be  so  careful  as  Golightly  to  ascertain  the  true 
sense  of  popular  texts,  but  I  had  come  to  regard  noth- 
ing with  so  much  suspicion  as  popular  interpreta- 
tion. 

Hence,  possibly,  my  present  questionings  were  less 
reverent  and  more  impatient  than  they  might  have 
been.  I  had  to  seek,  and  I  did  seek,  for  a  clue 
through  this  sea  of  doubtful  interpretations ;  but  I 
was  not  much  of  a  Biblical  scholar,  and  still  less  read 
in  the  Fathers,  or  even  in  our  own  divines.  The  lat- 
ter are  a  wordy  race,  and  one  has  to  be  a  long  time 
getting  at  the  pith  of  their  meaning.  Some  of  them 
seem  to  have  no  other  art  than  that  of  disguising  the 
weakness  of  their  convictions. 

My  general  impression  of  the  Church  of  England 
was  that  it  told  you  to  use  your  common  sense,  which 
upon  a  favorable  estimate  of  yourself  would  be  the 
teaching  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  It  appeared  to  be  uni- 
versally agreed  that  Scripture,  which  was  to  be  the 
rule  of  our  faith,  must  be,  to  use  the  words  of  a  popu- 
lar misinterpretation,  a  book  that  they  who  ran  might 
read.  That  is,  incapable  of  misinterpretation  except 
by  those  wilfully  prone  to  error.  This  being  the  case, 
any  orthodox  reader,  or  any  "  spiritually  minded  " 
reader,  would  find  this  common  sense  a  sufficient 
guide. 

What  common  sense  may  have  been  in  former 
days,  and  what  in  other  countries  now,  I  know  not, 


HOLY  WRIT. 


379 


but  in  England  it  is  a  personal  gift,  each  one  having 
a  common  sense  of  his  own,  and  no  two  agreeing, 
unless  their  tastes  and  objects  happen  to  be  the 
same,  or  they  resort  to  the  same  Commentary.  Any 
one  who  selected  such  portions  of  Scripture  as  his 
own  common  sense  or  his  favorite  Commentator's 
told  him  were  of  real  value  to  him  personally,  and 
in  these  times,  and  then  applied  that  common  sense 
to  their  interpretation,  seemed  to  me  very  liable  to 
self-deceit,  and  no  guide  to  earnest  inquirers.  He 
might  answer  his  own  purpose  by  the  method,  for 
that  was  what  he  wanted,  but  it  was  all.  It  was 
quite  impossible  to  say  what  people  would  not  drop 
altogether  out  of  count,  and  what  significance  would 
attach  to  the  scant  remainder,  under  the  guidance  of 
an  inward  monitor,  itself  the  creature  of  habit  and 
the  slave  of  the  will.  The  appeal  to  common  sense 
seemed  to  me,  "  Believe  just  as  much  as  suits  you, 
and  understand  it  as  you  please." 

All  that  does  very  well,  so  long  as  you  have  no 
other  wish  than  to  float  indolently  in  some  sluggish 
old  stream  of  traditional  interpretation.  But  I  was 
now  at  sea  —  such  a  sea,  indeed,  as  if  I  had  really 
embarked  on  the  perilous  voyage  once  proposed  to 
me  by  William  Froude.  Forgotten  texts  reappeared, 
slumbering  questions  awoke,  and  passages  that  had 
long  lain,  as  it  were,  in  the  trough  of  the  sea,  were 
now  curling  over  head,  and  threatening  to  overwhelm 
me. 

One  thing  was  now  very  plain  to  me.  It  was  that 
while  the  traditional  interpretations  of  the  Church  of 
England,  in  the  line  of  the  Thirty-nine  Articles,  were 
very  timorous  and  reticent  in  one  direction,  they  were 
very  negative  in  another.    There  are  people  so  con- 


380 


REMINISCENCES. 


stitutionally  and  habitually  given  to  negatives  that 
they  have  extinguished  the  power  of  definition  and 
assent  in  themselves,  and  in  those  who  submit  to  their 
influence.  It  is  dangerous  for  preachers  to  tell  people 
that  many  hundred  passages  in  Scripture  cannot  niean 
what  they  seem  to  mean,  and  in  fact  have  no  meaning 
that  concerns  us.  Hearers  who  are  so  disposed,  and 
many  are  so  disposed,  readily  hail  the  suggestion 
that  Scripture  generally  bears  whatever  sense  you 
may  wish  to  put  upon  it,  down  to  no  sense  at  all.  I 
was  then  in  no  mood  to  bow  down  to  this  idol  of 
"  common  sense  "  as  the  rule  of  Scriptural  interpreta- 
tion. It  was  the  teaching  of  men  who  exalted  com- 
mon sense  over  theology,  and  deprecated  its  usurpa- 
tions in  all  other  branches  of  knowledge,  in  arts  and 
in  sciences.  I  had  now  been  many  years  under  a 
very  different  teaching,  under  which  much  of  Holy 
Writ,  that  had  been  dead  before,  now  lived  to  me. 
Newman  had  always  seemed  to  me  to  start  from  the 
axiom  that  Scripture  must  mean  something,  while 
even  pious  people  were  content  that  much  of  it  should 
mean  nothing,  and  had  better  be  left  unintelligible. 
I  am  aware  that  there  are  those  who  think  that  literal 
interpretation  was  Newman's  great  error,  indeed  the 
chief  account  to  be  given  of  a  life's  aberration  from 
the  wise  Anglican  cou'rse.  I  should  myself  say  that 
he  did  cherish  and  freely  use  the  literal  sense,  without, 
however,  binding  himself  to  it,  or  seeing  nothing  in  a 
text  but  the  outside.  Inside  and  outside,  the  buried 
ore  and  the  glistering  surface,  had  both  come  from 
heaven,  and  he  would  turn  both  to  account.  If  you 
use  a  text  simply  for  illustration,  you  must  take  it  as 
it  is,  for  neither  eloquence  nor  exhortation  loves  the 
critical  mood. 


HOLY  WRIT. 


381 


On  the  whole  I  was  prepared  to  find  more  than 
the  great  Family  Bible'  of  the  period  would  allow  me. 
I  was  prepared  to  go  forward  in  the  direction  of 
faith.  It  is  true  that  I  was  as  a  poor  weakling,  who 
insists  on  joining  an  Alpine  adventure  when  he 
cannot  but  break  down  at  the  first  pinch  ;  or  as  the 
multitudes  that  hung  on  the  Crusades,  to  fall  out  and 
die  on  the  long  march. 


CHAPTER  CXXVI. 


THE  QUESTION  OF  THE  DAY. 

Throughout  the  great  conti'oversy  of  that  day  the 
choice  lay  between  two  things  which,  if  not  equally 
questioned,  were  equally  questionable.  First  of  all 
came  the  great  question  whether  the  Anglican 
Church  should  aim  at  a  more  Catholic  form  and 
manner  ;  and,  to  use  the  old  familiar  phrase,  set  bet- 
ter the  bone  badly  set  at  the  Reformation.  The  other 
alternative  was  imminent  and  hideous.  It  was  to  let 
the  Church  of  England  settle  down  like  a  scuttled 
ship  under  the  combined  attacks  of  Liberal  unbe- 
lievers, rationalists,  dissenters  of  every  variety,  and 
parties  and  schools  in  the  Church  who  also  had  their 
future,  and  who  were  ready  to  combine  for  any  act  of 
destruction. 

Then  for  the  Sacramental  question,  and  the  prac- 
tices depending  on  it.  I  have  always  maintained  and 
do  still  maintain,  that  the  Church  of  England  allows 
the  widest  scope  on  these  subjects,  and  abstains  from 
imposing  either  of  the  two  conflicting  theories  on 
those  who  seek  her  sacraments.  But  at  the  period  I 
am  writing  of  there  was  a  confident  and  very  general 
expectation  that  the  Church  of  England  was  to  be 
speedily  made  more  comprehensive  not  upwards  but 
downwards,  by  the  removal  of  everything  disagree- 
able to  Liberals,  Dissenters,  and  the  Anti-Sacramen- 
tarians  in  her  own  bosom. 


THE  QUESTION  OF  THE  DAY. 


383 


Tlien  there  was  the  lamentable  fact  that,  in  our 
towns,  Communion  was  almost  confined  to  the  well- 
to-do-classes,  the  mass  of  the  people  being  so  far  out 
of  the  pale,  and  without  that  which,  as  children,  they 
had  been  taught  was  a  necessary  of  spiritual  life. 

Nothing  has  raised  more  Protestant  indignation 
than  the  reservation,  the  exhibition,  and  the  carrying 
about  of  the  Host,  the  Victim  once  slain  for  the  sins 
of  the  world.  But  do  we  in  any  way  bring  before 
the  masses  of  our  people  the  great  saving  truths  thus 
feebly  represented  ?  Again,  it  might  be  all  well  for 
the  Anglicans  to  denounce  the  invocation  of  Saints, 
and  the  worship  of  the  Virgin,  but  here  in  their  own 
system  and  practice  was  an  absolute  blank.  Sepa- 
rated by  the  Reformation  from  the  Church  of  all  ages 
and  all  lands,  the  Church  of  England  has  no  Church 
in  heaven  to  call  its  own,  and  shows  not  even  the  de- 
sire to  communicate  with  it,  or  to  be  sure  that  there 
is  such  a  Church  at  all.  It  peoples  the  spiritual  uni- 
verse with  the  Father  and  the  Son,  and  certain  em- 
blematic representations  of  the  Spirit,  which  the 
Western  Churcli,  somewhat  roughly,  declares  to  pro- 
ceed from  Them. 

As  for  the  departed  generally,  it  allows  the  sur- 
vivors to  indulge  in  their  own  fancies,  so  as  they  do 
not  force  them  on  their  neighbors. 

The  national  mind  revolts  from  the  sacerdotal 
form  of  confession,  absolution,  and  penance  ;  but  even 
the  national  mind  laments,  in  its  more  tender  moods, 
that  confession  is  not  made  except  in  the  most  gre- 
garious fashion  ;  that  absolution  is  not  sought,  that 
penance  is  not  endured,  and  that  retribution  is  a  for- 
gotten idea. 

Again,  we  have  turned  out  statues  and  pictures 


384 


EEillNISCENCES. 


from  the  inside  of  our  churches.  But  we  yet  miss 
sadl)^  something  to  look  at,  and  prevent  our  eyes 
from  wandering  everywhere.  We  have  nothing  to 
fix  our  gaze  upon  except  the  Commandments,  most 
known  and  most  broken  of  all  known  laws,  and  the 
Prayer  and  the  Creed,  which  by  this  time  should  be 
engraven  too  deep  in  our  hearts  to  require  that  the 
text  should  be  always  before  our  eyes. 

We  denounce  the  authority  of  the  Pope,  and  gener- 
ally of  the  Western  Church  in  any  form  whatever. 
But  what  have  we  instead  ?  Lay  courts,  lay  judges, 
and  lay  lawyei-s,  whose  only  business  it  is  to  construe 
the  acts  of  a  legislature,  the  leading  part  of  which  is 
a  House  of  Commons,  which  is  not  even  lay,  for  a 
large  part  of  it  is  not  Anglican,  while  some  are  not 
even  Christian. 

Forty  years  ago  the  negative  side  of  the  Church 
of  England,  represented  in  all  these  contrasts,  was 
rapidly  increasing.  The  state  of  things  just  as  they 
were  did  not  seem  a  suflBcient  basis  for  defence 
against  the  general  dissolution  of  faith  threatening 
the  Church.  If  we  would  continue  to  believe  what 
we  professed  we  must  all  believe  more,  and  find  in 
more  definite  ideas  a  protection  from  growing  care- 
lessness and  indifference. 

This  growing  indifference  was  the  great  fact  of 
that  day.  It  was  a  public  fact,  a  social  fact,  an 
academic  fact,  a  domestic  fact.  A  man  might  avow 
any  phase  of  unbelief,  and  any  contempt  of  religion, 
without  loss  of  character,  in  the  service  of  the  state, 
in  societj',  at  Oxford,  and  at  home.  It  was  expected 
of  ever)'  young  man  in  "•  the  world."  If  he  was  wise 
he  held  his  tongue,  or  did  not  needlessly  shock  preju- 
dices. If  he  was  humorously  and  good-naturedly  pro- 


THE  QUESTION  OF  THE  DAY. 


385 


fane,  and  could  extract  amusement  out  of  such  barren 
stuff  as  the  Bible  and  the  Prayer  Book,  he  might  lose 
a  little,  but  he  would  certainly  gain  a  reputation 
■which  slower  wits  or  more  timid  hearts  might  envy. 
For  everything  short  of  fanatical  and  intolerant  athe- 
ism, there  was  not  only  condonance,  but  a  certain  de- 
gree of  admiration.  Good  mothers  were  proud  to  see 
their  sons  thinking  for  themselves,  and  knocking  over 
the  idols  themselves  were  bowing  to.  But  though 
impiety,  and  even  immorality,  did  not  signify.  Pop- 
ery did,  and  if  a  man  so  much  as  looked  that  way,  he 
forfeited  his  inhei'itance,  his  prospects,  his  popularity, 
the  confidence  of  his  equals,  and  the  love  of  his 
nearest  friends. 

VOL.  11.  25 


CHAPTER  CXXVII. 

DISCONTINUANCE  OF  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC." 

Such  had  been  the  state  of  affairs,  such  my  own 
little  part  in  them,  and  such  my  reflections  upon 
them,  when  I  went  to  Normandy  in  July.  To  these 
I  had  added,  without  intending  it,  a  large  Roman 
Catholic  experience  when  I  returned  to  Salisbury 
Plain  on  September  1,  1843.  Things  had  been  go- 
ing almost  headlong  at  Oxford  now  for  two  years. 
No.  90  had  appeared  early  in  1841.  It  was  cen- 
sured by  Bagot,  Bishop  of  Oxford,  defended  at  great 
length  by  Ward,  condemned  by  the  Hebdomadal 
Board,  which  not  many  years  after  itself  ceased  to 
exist.  The  "  Tracts  for  the  Times "  ceased  at  the 
moment  when  they  became  the  best  read  publication 
of  the  day.  Encouraged  by  these  attacks,  and  by 
this  submission,  a  flock  of  male  and  female  vultures 
darkened  the  air,  and  lighted  on  what  was  left  of  the 
ojEfending  tracts  and  other  writings  of  the  school. 

I  had  to  look  into  these  attacks,  some  worth  read- 
ing, most  of  them  not,  at  the  rate  of  a  score  a  day. 
When  I  had  read  a  few  pages,  and  dipped  in  here 
and  there,  it  always  occurred  to  me  to  ask  why  it 
was  that  these  good  people,  so  alive  as  they  all  were 
to  the  danger  of  believing  a  little  too  much,  seemed 
perfectly  indifferent  to  the  certain  fact  that  a  large 
part  of  the  so-called  Christian  world  believed  either 
nothing  at  all,  or  so  little  that  it  never  showed 


DISCONTINUANCE  OF  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC."  387 


itself,  and  could  never  be  ascertained.  I  then  felt, 
and  I  still  feel,  that  as  matter  of  doctrine,  that  is  of 
belief,  the  difference  between  what  is  held  by  English 
Churchmen,  and  what  is  held  by  Roman  Catholics, 
is  infinitesimal.  There  is  absolutely  no  comparison 
between  the  doctrine  of  the  Incarnation  and  all  the 
special  beliefs  and  practices  dividing  us  from  Rome. 
That  indeed  is  the  Continental  estimate  of  the  mat- 
ter. When  an  ordinary  French  or  Italian  gentleman 
hears  that  a  respectable  English  gentleman  actually 
believes  that  "the  birth  of  Jesus  Christ  was  on  this 
wise,"  he  sets  him  down  as  afar  greater  fool  than 
the  uneducated  peasant  who  holds  a  few  trifling  and 
harmless  superstitions.  The  enlightened  Italian  will 
look  you  in  the  face  and  tell  you  that  if  a  man  be- 
lieves the  Bible  he  is  prepared  to  believe  any  lie,  and 
to  tell  any  lie ;  and  this  he  says  with  a  special  regard 
to  the  great  doctrines  which  are  at  once  the  founda- 
tion and  the  key  of  the  whole  structure. 

Of  course  I  admit  that  though  the  Roman  Catholic 
additions,  developments,  concretions,  or  whatever 
they  may  be  called,  are  infinitesimal  in  the  scale  of 
doctrine,  the  practical,  that  is,  the  political  and  social, 
difference  is  very  great.  Rome  is  a  power ;  the 
priesthood  is  a  power ;  and  in  the  matter  of  confes- 
sion there  is  the  choice  —  if  choice  it  may  be  called  — 
between  a  painful  submission  and  a  burdensome 
neglect.  But  all  the  writers  I  am  speaking  of  were 
riding  the  high  horse,  that  is  the  high  doctrinal 
question ;  and  it  was  always  strange  to  me  that 
while  they  seemed  utterly  indifferent  to  pure  deism, 
or  absolute  atheism,  they  were  driven  into  fits  by 
matters  which  are  but  as  dust  in  the  scales  of  Divino 
truth. 


388 


BEMIKISCEXCES. 


I  cannot  remember  whether  it  was  in  18-1:2  or 
184:3  that  I  had  had  to  stand  before  the  Bishop  of 
Salisbury'  at  a  Visitation,  and  listen  to  a  carefully 
composed  censure  on  the  Oxford  movement,  with  a 
passage  which  both  I  and  my  neighbors  understood 
to  be  aimed  at  myself.  My  impression  at  the  time 
was  that  it  was  borrowed  from  that  passage  in  the 
"  Clouds  "  of  Aristophanes,  Avhere  Socrates  is  intro- 
duced suspended  in  a  basket  and  conversing  with  the 
newly  invented  divinities.  Certainly  Socrates  was 
not  a  man  of  position,  or  indeed  of  the  world.  A 
man  who  deals  with  Church  matters,  and  human 
affairs  generally,  from  a  small  village  in  Salisbury 
Plain,  and  who  when  he  goes  to  town  finds  himself 
a  man  on  the  pavement,  between  his  hotel  and  the 
printer,  may  be  said  to  be  hung  in  a  basket.  How- 
ever, the  Bishop  was  bound  to  say  something,  and, 
being  a  good  classical  scholar,  he  could  not  prevent 
the  old  ideas  from  running  in  his  head.  The  "  Four 
Tutors  "  had  now  invoked  the  readv  intervention  of 
the  Vice-Chancellor  to  the  rescue  of  the  orthodoxy, 
or  the  peace  and  quiet  of  Oxford,  and  had  won  an 
easy,  if  not  a  pre-arranged  victory.  Jsewman  had 
immediately  met  the  challenge  of  the  "Four  Tutors," 
whom  in  so  doing  he  had  called  the  "  Four  Gentle- 
men." It  did  not  seem  to  me  a  happy  expression. 
They  were  gentlemen,  of  course,  but  they  were  not 
equally  gentlemen.  Tom  Churton,  for  example,  was 
a  very  queer  fellow,  an  exception  to  his  family,  and 
an  exception  to  his  class.  Another  of  the  Four  evi- 
dentl}-  did  not  know  his  own  opinions  at  the  time, 
for  he  soon  found  himself  in  a  case  to  ask  for  a  Uberal 
interpretation,  instead  of  disallowing  it. 

It  did  occur  to  me  that  Newman  might  not  choose 


DISCONTINUANCE  OF  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC."  889 


to  recognize  any  special  right  in  Tutors  to  move  the 
University  in  religious  matters.  They  were  ceasing 
to  have  anything  to  do  with  the  religion  of  the 
undergraduates.  In  the  matter  of  religious  belief, 
"  Four  Tutors"  had  no  more  meaning  now  than  Four 
Bursars,  or  Four  College  Stewards.  Newman  him- 
self had  led  the  last  struggle  for  the  ancient  quasi- 
parental  and  religious  character  of  the  College  Tutor 
and  had  been  beaten.  The  University  was  now 
drifting  away  from  its  old  anchorage  in  the  Christian 
faith,  and  Tutors  were  fast  sinking  into  lectui'ers  in 
classics  and  mathematics.  What,  then,  had  the  name 
of  Tutor  to  do  with  the  religious  controversy  ? 

Our  good  Primate  must  sometimes  smile  to  think  of 
his  colleagues  on  this  occasion.  But  this  is  always  the 
case  with  combined  demonstrations,  in  which  variety 
is  first  a  necessitj',  but  afterwards  a  scandal.  I  was 
too  busy  and  too  far  from  the  scene  to  follow  the 
literature  of  that  occasion.  No.  90  itself,  and  the 
stronger  tracts  of  the  series,  including  that  which  com- 
pares Romish  scandals  and  difficulties  with  those  of 
the  Old  Testament,  I  had  read  with  much  interest 
and  care.  I  had  agreed  with  them,  all  the  while 
trembling  at  the  writers'  audacity.  The  suspension 
of  Pusey  from  the  University  pulpit,  and  my  own 
article  on  the  Six  Doctors,  were  then  the  most  recent 
of  these  violent  proceedings,  but  evidently  not  to  be 
the  last.  Thus  the  gi'ound  was  shaking  under  us,  and 
the  very  atmosphere  seemed  to  be  charged  with  de- 
struction. 

Immediately  on  my  return  alone  from  the  Val- 
rogers,  I  had  to  attend  to  the  forthcoming  number  of 
the  "British  Critic."  There  were  letters  to  be  an- 
swered, much  MS.  to  be  read,  and  several  parcels  of 


390 


EEMINISCENCES. 


books  to  be  dealt  with  at  such  leisure  as  I  could  com- 
mand. In  rapid  succession  e\ery  point  of  the  great 
controversy  returned  again  and  again  to  me.  It  had 
now  been  repeatedly  declared  by  my  own  Bishop,  by 
most  of  the  Bishops,  by  the  University,  and  by  some 
whom  I  loved  and  respected,  that  the  conclusions  to 
which  I  had  deliberately  assented  were  not  compatible 
with  a  ministerial  position  in  the  Church  of  England, 
or  Avith  the  performance  of  sacred  offices  in  it.  New- 
man's own  retirement  to  Littlemore  seemed  to  admit 
this.  I  attempted,  as  I  resumed  my  work,  indeed  I 
think  it  was  before  I  resumed  it,  to  sum  up  the  whole 
controversy,  and  bring  it  to  a  practical  point,  for  at 
such  a  point  I  had  plainly  arrived.  It  was  "  to  be  or 
not  to  be  "  in  the  Church  of  England. 

As  I  have  related  in  the  preceding  chapter,  I  had 
found  that,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  it  is  the  will  that 
decides  this  question.  The  minor  issues,  the  details, 
the  offences  and  scandals,  sink  to  nothing  compared 
Avith  the  current  of  the  mind  running  in  the  direction 
most  congenial  to  one's  nature.  Nobody  attaches  the 
slightest  importance  to  the  particular  reasons  which  a 
man  may  allege,  and  even  think  that  he  has,  for  .be- 
coming a  Baptist,  or  a  Plymouth  Brother,  or  a  Unita- 
rian. His  new  communion  is  more  to  his  liking  and 
agrees  better  with  his  religious  ideas  than  the  old  one. 
The  struggle  is  generally  deep  in  a  man's  nature  ;  too 
deep  for  either  himself  or  any  one  else  to  have  a  true 
notion  of.  It  is  a  battle,  with  confusion  and  din,  in 
which  he  may  think  himself  a  commander,  but  is  only 
a  common  soldier.  I  had  been  brought  face  to  face 
with  the  great  Church  of  Western  Christendom,  and 
now  the  question  was  whether  I  was  to  advance  or 
retreatj  when  even  retreat  seemed  denied  me. 


DISCONTINUANCE  OF  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC."  391 


Can  I  swallow  this  ?  Can  I  take  part  in  that  ? 
Can  I  say  this  and  not  be  untrue?  Can  I  do  that 
and  not  be  a  hypocrite?  Can  I  do  something  else 
and  not  find  condemnation  starting  up  from  my  own 
■writings,  my  own  recollections,  nay  from  my  old  con- 
victions not  yet  quite  shaken  off.  But  something  I 
must  do,  and  it  must  be  decisive. 

It  can  only  have  been  two  or  three  days  after  my 
return  from  Normandy  that  I  wrote  to  Newman,  and 
to  various  members  of  my  family,  to  the  effect  that  I 
had  serious  thoughts  of  joining  the  Church  of  Rome. 
At  the  same  time  I  wrote  to  Rivington,  giving  up 
the  "  British  Critic."  My  friends,  of  course,  were 
shocked  and  grieved.  Of  Newman's  letter  I  must 
speak  from  recollection.  I  am  not  sure  that  I  have 
not  both  my  letter  and  his  reply  somewhere  among 
my  papers,  but  I  don't  expect,  or  even  much  care, 
to  see  them  again.  If  I  am  told  that  I  have  given 
an  incorrect  account  of  the  reply,  I  will  look  for  the 
letters. 

Newman  was  surprised.  From  mj  own  showing 
he  could  not  think  I  was  in  a  state  to  take  a  strong 
step.  A  man  ought  to  give  at  least  two  years  to  the 
consideration  of  it,  and  to  be  assured  that  his  reasons 
and  his  motives  were  right.  In  a  divided  state  of 
mind  I  could  not  go  on  with  the  "  British  Critic,"  but 
then  there  was  my  unfinished  church,  which  seemed 
providentially  designed  to  compel  deliberation.  By 
the  time  I  had  completed  it  I  should  know  my  own 
mind  better,  and  there  would  not  be  the  scandal  of 
leaving  the  work  to  my  successors,  perliaps  unable 
to  finish  it.  There  was  more  to  the  same  effect, 
but  the  advice  was  definite.  "  Think  over  it  two 
years." 


392 


REMraiSCENCES. 


This  was  disappointing.  It  would  indeed  have 
been  a  great  trouble  to  me  to  leave  the  church  un- 
finished, for  its  extravagant  scale  and  style  made  the 
question  one  between  a  grand  success  and  a  ridiculous 
failure.  I  should,  too,  have  been  sorry  to  plunge  a 
poor  man,  as  my  successor  would  probably  be,  into  a 
costly  and  troublesome  work.  Yet,  had  Newman  ex- 
pressed approval,  or  the  merest  acquiescence,  I  should 
have  gone  over  at  once,  with  what  consequences  I 
can  hardly  venture  to  imagine. 

After  the  lapse  of  thirty-nine  years,  which  is  more 
than  half  my  whole  lifetime,  I  do  not  find  it  easy  to 
recall  the  state  of  mind,  or  even  all  the  circumstances, 
under  which  I  formed  this  resolution.  Possibly,  just 
as  a  man's  own  neighbors  can  often  understand  his 
movements  and  motives  better  than  he  does  himself,  so 
I  may  now  have  arrived  at  the  distance  of  time  neces- 
sary to  an  impartial  judgment  on  myself. 

I  believe  I  was  seeking  rest.  I  was  distracted  and 
wearied  with  discn-sions  above  my  measure,  my  fac- 
ulties, and  my  attainments.  I  disliked  the  tone  of 
disputants,  all  the  more  because  I  easily  fell  into  it 
myself. 

The  Church  of  England  was  one  vast  arena  of  con- 
troversy. Ten  thousand  popes  —  the  lay  popes  ten 
times  more  arrogant,  unreasonable,  and  bitter  than 
the  clerical,  and  the  female  popes  a  hundred  times 
worse  than  either  —  laid  down  the  law  and  demanded 
instant  obedience.  Everybody  was  always  being 
called  upon  to  defend  his  opinion,  if  he  ventured  to 
have  one,  and  was  not  allowed  even  to  dream  quietly. 
He  had  to  show  a  reason  for  everything,  though  he 
might  be  the  first  himself  to  feel  that  he  had  no  rea- 
son to  show  for  a  cherished  belief. 


DISCONTINUANCE  OF  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC."  393 


The  tendency  of  the  mass,  not  only  of  the  people, 
but  of  the  Church  and  of  the  academic  world,  was 
negative.  This  negation  was  at  once  impudent  and 
hj'pocritical.  The  opponents  of  the  "  movement  " 
were  always  charging  upon  it  hypocrisy  and  conceal- 
ment, at  the  very  time  that  they  were  conscious  of  an 
amount  of  skepticism  and  downright  unbelief  that 
they  could  not  venture  to  avow,  as  their  own  mouth 
would  be  stopped  thereby. 

But  there  was  also  that  which  most  will  think  to 
the  credit  of  the  Church  of  England.  The  English 
Churchman,  on  his  own  theory  of  spiritual  life,  and 
by  virtue  of  his  position,  must  be  always  fighting  for 
the  truth,  and  actually  the  member  of  a  Church 
militant.  He  must  be  supposed  to  have  won  the 
truth  or  captured  it  out  of  the  hand  of  many  foes. 
Now,  so  far  as  regards  the  great  truths  of  Revela- 
tion, all  this  was  to  me  pure  misery.  I  wished  to 
live  and  let  live.  I  wished  to  think  as  I  pleased 
and  let  others  think  as  they  pleased.  Only  my 
sense  of  justice  made  me  cry  for  fair-dealing  and 
equality. 

But  should  I  get  that  in  the  Church  of  Rome? 
That  is  a  question,  and  it  is  a  question  that  few 
Protestants  see  the  whole  of.  They  do  not  even  see 
the  whole  meaning  of  their  own  words.  They  charge 
Rome  with  depriving  men  of  the  right  of  private 
judgment.  Why,  this  is  to  relieve  them  of  a  task 
generally  above  their  powers.  It  gives  them  a  harbor 
of  refuge  from  a  continual  storm.  They  are  to  be  no 
longer  answerable  for  their  opinions.  So  as  they 
conform  and  obey,  the  Church  of  Rome  will  not  be 
always  putting  them  into  an  arena  to  fight  wild 
beasts.     I  really  think  it  would  have  suited  my 


394 


EEMINISCENCES. 


nature  to  accept  all  the  decisions  of  the  Church  of 
Rome  in  a  quiet  lay  fashion,  and  then  turn  my  atten- 
tion to  matters  more  in  my  own  line.  Yet  even  if 
thus  I  had  escaped  shipwreck,  I  might  have  rotted  in 
harbor  and  gone  down. 


CHAPTER  CXXVIII. 

THE  PROPKIETOE  OF  THE  "  BRITISH  CKITIC." 

RlVlNGTON,  to  whom  I  gave  no  reason  for  my 
sudden  withdrawal,  was  very  kind,  though  evidently 
unprepared  and  much  concerned.  I  think  he  wrote 
to  Newman,  who  declined  to  name  a  successor.  I 
was  not  myself  the  least  prepared  for  Rivington's 
decision  to  discontinue  the  Review.  Of  course  that 
only  shows  my  stupidity,  for  there  was  nothing  else 
to  be  done.  The  "  Christian  Remembrancer  "  imme- 
diately took  the  place  of  the  "  British  Critic,"  and  a 
large  part  of  the  readers  of  the  latter  were  consoled 
for  their  loss.  To  Rivington,  however,  it  must  have 
been  a  serious  matter,  and  I  was  much  grieved  on 
his  account.  His  way  of  taking  it  then  and  long 
after  deeply  impressed  me.  There  was  not  even  a 
suspicion  of  reproof  or  complaint  in  his  words  or  his 
looks  ;  and  he  never  made  any  allusion  to  my  run- 
away horses,  Wai'd  and  Oakley,  or  to  any  of  the 
articles  to  which  exception  might  justly  have  been 
taken.  He  could  not  have  been  kinder  to  me  if  I 
had  so  edited  his  Review  as  to  drive  the  "  Edinburgh" 
and  the  "  Quarterly  "  out  of  the  field. 

Some  years  after  I  was  residing  for  a  few  months 
at  Hampstead,  and  came  across  Rivington,  with 
whom  I  had  some  pleasant  talks.  He  asked  me  to 
dine  more  than  once.  The  last  occasion  was  one 
which  under  ordinary  circumstances  should  have  been 


396 


REMINISCENCES. 


singiilarly  happy  and  brilliant ;  a  white  day  in  any 
man's  life.  It  was  a  dinner  to  authors  and  writers. 
As  I  was  not  a  member  of  any  club,  it  was  almost 
my  first  introduction  to  the  literary  world.  jNIany  of 
the  names  were  new  to  me  and  have  passed  out  of  my 
recollection.  There  were,  however,  if  I  remember 
right,  ^lontgomery,  of  Percy  Chapel,  and  Words- 
worth, now  Bishop  of  Lincoln.  The  conversation 
seemed  in  a  suppressed  tone,  discursive,  and  seldom 
rising  above  the  usual  colloquy  of  a  man  with  his 
next  neighbor. 

The  fact  was,  a  terrible  blow  had  just  fallen  on 
English  literature.  This  was  a  funeral  feast  over 
scores  of  promising  works,  born  to  die  at  once,  some 
indeed  never  to  be  heard  of,  so  I  have  been  told,  but 
to  pass  straight  from  the  press  to  the  vat.  It  was  the 
year  of  "  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin."  All  the  'ologies,  all 
the  arts  and  sciences,  histories,  travels,  fictions,  facts, 
light  literature,  heavy  literature,  everything  that 
man  can  read,  perished  in  that  fatal  blight.  Mrs. 
Beecher  Stowe  had  found  the  Garden  of  Eden  before 
her,  but  she  left  a  wilderness  behind,  and  in  this 
wilderness  I  was  now  sitting  down  with  a  score  of 
the  chief  sufferers.  I  had  no  business  there,  for  I 
belonged  to  the  camp  of  the  destroyer.  I  had  been 
absorbed  in  the  book,  I  had  shed  tears  over  it,  and 
devoured  every  line.  I  had  been,  and  was  now  still 
more  than  ever,  rather  strong  against  slaveiy,  though 
I  could  not  hold  it  to  be  quite  incompatible  with  the 
Gospel. 

The  common  affliction  was  only  alluded  to  once  or 
twice,  as  a  grief  too  big  for  words.  I  have  forgotten 
the  book,  except  just  a  few  names.  I  never  read  it  a 
second  time,  nor  did  I  read  any  other  work  of  Mrs. 


DISCONTINUANCE  OF  THE  "BRITISH  CRITIC."  397 


Beeclier  Stowe.  I  went  to  a  reception  given  to  her 
at  Willis's  Rooms,  when  she  seemed  to  me  a  weird, 
uncanny  creature,  more  French  than  English,  and 
her  husband  a  remarkably  fine  specimen  of  the  An- 
glo-Saxon race,  and  no  improvement  upon  it.  There 
can  be  Uttle  doubt  that  the  book  greatly  exasperated 
the  ill-feeling  between  North  and  South,  and  so  con- 
tributed to  the  Civil  War,  and  the  extinction  of 
American  slavery. 

Many  years  afterwards  I  was  involuntarily  re- 
minded of  the  Hampstead  dinner  by  a  horrible  story 
in  one  of  Dickens'  Christmas  numbers,  not  very 
suitable  to  the  season.  It  was  a  Parisian  euthanasia. 
A  physician  opened  his  house  from  time  to  time  to 
self-invited  guests,  who  sat  down  to  a  succession  of 
the  greatest  achievements  of  the  French  cuisine. 
But  in  every  dish  there  was  poison  of  one  sort  or  an- 
other so  skilfully  dispensed  that  the  operation  of  the 
whole  could  produce  nothing  worse  than  a  good 
night's  sleep,  from  which,  however,  the  guest  would 
not  awake  again.  It  was  in  fact  a  dinner  of  suicides, 
seeking  a  painless  extinction.  The  company  were 
bound  to  keep  up  one  another's  spirits,  but  that  was 
not  easy,  for  the)'-  had  only  one  future,  and  that  was 
a  blank.  The  only  topic  they  had  in  common  was 
one  they  could  not  talk  about.  Yet  talk  they  must. 
Every  now  and  then  it  was  evident  the  speaker  was 
suddenly  pulling  up,  and  changing  the  line  of  his  re- 
marks. As  the  story  ran,  the  doctor's  manipulations 
were  not  entirely  successful.  Though  he  watched  his 
patients  closely,  interdicted  dishes  they  were  running 
on,  and  ordered  some  counteractives,  there  was  a 
dreadful  scene  or  two. 

So  far  as  I  remember,  on  this  occasion  Rivington 


398 


REMINISCENCES, 


•was  quite  successful,  and  no  stranger  would  have 
gathered  from  the  conversation,  and  the  looks  of  the 
company,  that  they  were  sensible  of  any  profounder 
affliction  than  the  ordinary  dulness  of  a  large  and 
miscellaneous  dinner  party. 


CHAPTER  CXXIX. 


WHERE  LANDED. 

I  "WAS  now  under  a  direction,  which  to  me  was  a 
command,  to  wait  for  two  years  before  a  final  decis- 
ion. Two  years  are  not  too  long  for  a  consideration 
affecting  one's  eternal  happiness,  and  the  present  and 
future  happiness  of  many.  But  I  had  always  found 
it  not  easy  to  concentrate  my  attention  on  a  serious 
matter  for  even  ten  minutes.  There  was  sure  to  be 
some  irrelevant  idea  shooting  right  athwart  the  range 
of  my  speculations.  It  is  so  invariably  the  case  that, 
sometimes  in  charity  to  my  poor  self,  I  have  tried  to 
account  for  it  physically.  Was  it  a  peculiar  working 
in  the  organ  of  vision  ?  Had  I  a  bee  in  my  bonnet  ? 
I  know  the  Provost,  who  himself  could  work  his  men- 
tal apparatus  with  perfect  regularity,  thought  some- 
times I  was  light-headed.  I  can,  however,  return  to 
a  point  again  and  again.  My  time,  too,  was  now  en- 
tirely occupied,  and  it  was  very  soon  apparent  that  I 
was  taking  two  years,  but  not  employing  them  as  di- 
rected. 

I  cannot  remember  when,  or  how,  Newman  told 
me  what  must  have  been  in  his  own  anticipations, 
indeed  in  his  own  theory  of  the  spiritual  work  to  be 
done,  that  if  I  was  ever  to  go  over,  it  would  be,  and 
indeed  ought  to  be,  by  a  superior  act  of  volition  over- 
ruling and  containing  my  own.  The  Almighty  would 
give  me  the  opportunity  and  the  call,  as  well  as  the 


400 


BEMINISCENCES. 


power,  and  the  mode  of  conversion.  At  the  time  it- 
self I  was  so  far  from  interpreting  the  injunction  of 
two  years'  waiting  correctlj',  that  it  gave  me  a  fresh 
assurance  that  Newman  himself  did  not  in  the  least 
contemplate  the  possibility  of  himself  taking  the  step. 
I  could  not  realize  his  sitting  down  deliberately  to 
give  two  years  to  working  out  the  problem.  The  fact 
was  he  did  not  intend  to  work  out  any  problem  at  all, 
but  to  wait  for  further  light  from  his  Heavenly  Guide. 

In  the  "Apologia"  Newman  describes  himself  as 
true  to  the  law  of  his  nature  and  his  life  from  the 
hour  of  his  conversion  in  very  early  years.  By  a 
special  inspiration  he  received  that  faith  which  he 
long  held  in  common  with  Anglican  believers;  and 
by  a  special  inspiration  also  he  finally  received  the 
submission  of  heart  and  mind  to  Rome.  From  one 
change  to  the  other,  it  was  one  regular  spiritual 
growth. 

There  was  at  one  time  an  apparent  deviation  from 
this  course  ;  I  mention  it  with  the  greatest  humility, 
and  should  not  venture  to  mention  it  were  it  not  that 
a  chance  criticism  by  a  writer  of  great  keenness  and 
occasional  justice  seems  to  agree  with  it.  Allusion 
Has  been  made  above  to  a  very  important  paper  on 
the  points  of  difference  between  the  "  Evangelical  " 
and  the  "Anglican"  systems,  which  Newman  circu- 
lated amongst  his  friends ;  it  must  have  been  imme- 
diately after  completing  his  work  on  the  Arians,  in 
1832.  The  tendency  of  that  paper  certainly  was  not 
to  encourage  any  waiting  for  conversions  of  any 
kind,  or  any  belief  likely  to  discourage  inquiry  or  to 
weaken  the  will.  It  suggested  the  idea  of  a  man,  a 
theologian  of  the  old  dogmatic  type,  with  all  the 
materials  of  knowledge  lying  before  him  and  about 


WHERE  LANDED, 


401 


him,  working  his  way  by  the  use  of  an  enlightened 
reason  through  the  maze  of  texts  and  authorities.  In 
such  a  maze  had  Newman  been  when  he  wrote  this 
paper,  and  in  a  field  quite  new,  now  for  a  twelve- 
month. The  vast  work  had  been  spread  out  before 
him,  and  he  had  had  but  little  time,  indeed  little  oc- 
casion, to  consult  the  workings  of  his  own  heart  upon 
this  copious  ingathering. 

Stanley's  remark  is  that  Newman  had  not  yet  got 
into  the  spirit  of  the  Fathers  when  he  finished  the 
book  on  the  Arians.  It  certainly  is,  with  some  not- 
able exceptions,  less  eloquent  and  less  moving  than 
his  other  writings.  It  had  been  undertaken  and  be- 
gun as  a  light,  handy  volume,  meant  to  beguile  the 
dulness  of  an  idle  hour,  and  it  became  such  a  rock  as 
Ajax  himself  might  vainly  strive  to  throw.  All  the 
Fathers  and  all  the  Church  Councils  were  to  be  mar- 
shalled in  Anglican  order  and  costume,  and  marched 
before  us  as  we  sat  at  our  firesides.  It  was  terribly 
outside  work,  and  possibly  the  iron,  indeed  the  very 
rust  of  it,  entered  into  Newman's  soul.  It  might  be 
in  this  stage  of  deviation,  like  the  faulty  joint  occa- 
sionally found  in  the  pine,  noticed  by  Shakespeare, 
that  the  above  paper  was  written.  I,  too,  was  tliink- 
ing  just  as  I  was  doing,  and  what  I  was  doing  was 
on  the  table  before  me  —  pen,  ink,  paper,  piles  of 
books,  and  stray  memoranda. 

No  doubt  Newman's  reply  did  urge  upon  me  the 
spirit  of  self-humiliation  and  discipline  in  which  such 
an  inquiry  ought  to  be  conducted  ;  but  I  soon  found 
myself  not  at  home  in  a  state  of  expectancy,  in 
which  I  must  not  trust  to  that  ordinary  reason  which 
had  hitherto  been  my  very  fallible  guide,  but  wait 
for  an  enlightened  volition. 

VOL.  II.  26 


402 


REMINISCENCES. 


In  the  abstract,  and  in  regard  to  other  people,  I 
had  long  recognized  the  predominance  of  will  in 
matters  of  faith ;  that  is,  of  will  formed  by  circum- 
stances, habits,  traditions,  and  prejudices.  In  so 
doing  I  had  always  pitied  the  unfortunate  persons, 
indeed  the  vast  multitudes,  who  had  lost  either  the 
whole  truth,  or  a  large  part  of  it,  through  the  fatal 
dominion  of  a  vicious  or  ill-educated  will.  The  will 
itself,  one  is  told  continually,  is  corrupted,  obstinate, 
and  wayward.  It  is  thus  the  worst  enemy  of  truth. 
Yet  through  the  will  I  was  now  to  attain  the  truth ; 
that  is,  through  the  inspired  will  I  was  to  attain  that 
truth  which  only  comes  by  inspiration. 

All  this  time  my  unfinished  church  stood  before 
me,  the  flint  and  stone  walls  temporarily  protected 
by  rough  red  tiles,  and  not  likely  to  be  completed, 
or  even  proceeded  with,  in  two  years,  or  even  in  ten. 
That  told  for  unlimited  delay.  Then  there  arose  the 
question  whether  I  could  conscientiously  finish  the 
building  for  the  Church  of  England  while  I  was  en- 
tertaining a  doubt  of  its  authority.  Upon  this  came 
the  larger  question,  "  Could  I  go  on  ministering  in 
the  Church  of  England,  with  a  crippled  faith  in  its 
position,  its  Articles,  its  order  of  worship,  its  rites 
and  ceremonies  ?  " 

Of  course  I  was  not  so  unreasonable  as  to  expect 
ever  to  quit  the  Anglican  communion  in  a  way  quite 
satisfactory  to  those  I  was  leaving  behind,  for  no  man 
has  done  that  yet,  the  British  public  being  quite  re- 
solved there  shall  be  something  wrong  in  the  manner 
of  doing  it  —  some  treachery,  some  concealment, 
some  want  of  proper  feeling  or  good  manners.  But 
if  I  was  to  do  at  all  what  would  be  horrible  to  many 
kind  friends,  I  must  do  it  as  well  as  I  could. 


WHERE  LANDED. 


403 


As  I  returned  to  the  question  over  and  over  again 
in  that  month  of  September,  alone  as  I  was  in  Salis- 
bury Plain,  I  felt  more  and  more  that  there  must  be 
a  call  of  some  sort  or  other.  In  my  own  case  that 
would  not  be  such  a  call  as  the  Evangelicals  suppose 
to  be  necessary  —  a  sudden,  distinct,  and  overpower- 
ing conviction,  plainly  coming  direct  from  Heaven. 
In  days  long  before  this  period  I  had  occasionally  had 
fits  of  deep  despondency,  or  rather  of  deep  disgust, 
with  earth  and  all  earthly  affairs,  yet  I  fear  without 
a  very  palpable  reaction  towards  the  Source  of  all 
true  happiness.  Let  saints  describe  their  pits  of  de- 
spond as  they  please.  My  misery  took  the  material 
form  which  prompted  the  old  cry  of  "  Vanity,  van- 
ity ;  all  things  are  vanity."  My  mind  dwelt  on  the 
mansions  reduced  by  fire  to  cinders,  or  by  neglect 
to  rottenness  ;  on  estates  wasted  and  overrun  with 
weeds;  on  the  labors  of  a  life  reduced  to  nothing  in 
an  hour ;  on  imaginary  wealth  discovered  to  be  waste 
paper,  or  jewels  discovered  to  be  counterfeit ;  and  all 
the  disappointments  to  which  matter  is  liable.  The 
only  result  of  these  sensations,  deep  as  they  some- 
times were,  had  been  a  certain  careless  and  cynical 
indifference  to  money,  land,  position,  and  the  ordi- 
nary objects  of  ambition.  But  I  doubt  whether  they 
ever  made  me  a  bit  the  more  spiritually  minded. 

My  call  to  Rome,  if  it  ever  should  be,  must  be  one 
written  in  circumstances,  and  be  intelligible  alike  to 
myself  and  to  my  friends.  Some  will  smile  at  such 
an  idea,  but  the  truth  is  the  call  of  circumstances  is 
all  the  call  the  great  mass  of  mankind,  specially  of 
my  own  countrymen,  have  ever  had  to  Rome,  or  to 
any  other  communion.  They  are  whei'e  they  are, 
and  what  they  are,  by  force  of  circumstances.  They 


404 


REMINISCENCES. 


may  flatter  themselves  they  are  exercising  private 
judgment,  and  that  they  have  selected  their  own  be- 
liefs ;  but  the  intensely  national  feelings  of  our  peo- 
ple, and  their  strong  secular  leanings  and  complica- 
tions, necessai'ily  mould  them  in  traditional  forms. 
If  this  be  true,  is  it  a  slur?  Is  it  a  disadvantage? 
Is  a  man  the  worse  Christian  for  being  a  Christian 
after  the  manner  of  his  fathers,  and  of  those  about 
him?  As  it  is  the  will  of  the  Almightj'^  with  re- 
gard, to  the  greater  part  of  mankind,  we  must  speak 
charitably  and  reverentially  of  a  law  which  however 
should  rather  humble  us  than  be  made  a  matter  of 
vain  boasting.  Civilization  and  high  culture  are  not 
so  far  fi'om  nature,  or  so  great  an  improvement  upon 
it,  as  to  be  entitled  to  pronounce  its  dictates  foolish 
or  wrong.  Plainly,  it  is  better  that  people  in  general 
should  accept  the  religious  forms  and  ideas,  the  words 
and  the  customs  they  find,  and  should  abstain  from 
disturbing  others  accepting  them,  unless  upon  a  very 
great  and  evident  call. 

If  this  be  so  —  if  indeed  it  is  the  order  of  Provi- 
dence—  it  follows  that  forms,  words,  and  customs 
cannot  have  the  terrible  significance  which  contro- 
versialists are  apt  to  give  them.  There  cannot  be  so 
much  virtue,  or  so  much  mischief,  in  either  the  posi- 
tive or  the  negative  side.  It  cannot  make  so  very 
much  difference  whether  a  man  believes  the  conse- 
crated wafer  to  be  the  Body  of  Christ,  or  believes  it 
no  more  than  what  came  from  out  of  the  oven ; 
whether  he  invokes  the  Saints  and  the  Blessed  Vir- 
gin, or  believes  that  they  cannot  hear  him,  and  that 
they  can  do  him  no  good  ;  whether  he  believes  there 
is  a  virtue  in  Orders,  or  nothing  but  edifying  forms  ; 
whether  he  believes  in  a  purgatory  or  a  dead  sleep  till 


WHEEE  LANDED. 


405 


Judgment  Day.  A  man  may  I  hope  be  "  liberal  "  as 
regards  such  questions,  which  certainly  have  a  lesser 
place  and  rank  in  Revelation. 

Moreover,  these  and  other  still  more  questionable 
beliefs  of  the  ante-Reformation  Churches  are  widely 
accepted  in  a  very  substantial  way  by  many  who 
would  refuse  to  acknowledge  them  in  formal  language. 
Religious  jjeople  live  amongst  the  saints  of  all  ages, 
making  their  choice  indeed,  as  the  Roman  peasant  or 
devotee  does  also.  Religious  people  of  all  names 
hear  with  love  and  awe  the  command  given  from  the 
Cross,  "  Behold  thy  Mother  ;  "  and  it  is  certain  that 
the  elevation  of  the  sex,  which  cannot  be  said  to  be 
less  evident  now  than  it  was  before  the  Reformation, 
is  due  to  that  natural  worship  which  the  heart  cannot 
but  give  to  tlie  Mother  of  our  Lord. 

Far  and  widely  antecedent  to  tlie  whole  matter  of 
Revelation  is  the  fact  of  beliefs  and  practices  being 
natural  to  all  men.  From  nature  man  has  learnt  to 
dream,  and  so  to  believe,  in  a  Maker  and  Preserver, 
in  sons  of  God,  in  angelic  hosts,  in  ministering  spirits, 
in  messengers  of  peace  or  of  woe,  in  threads  of  des- 
tiny running  through  tlie  web  of  human  affairs,  in  Di- 
vine interventions  to  rectify  the  balance  of  earthly 
forces,  in  that  day  of  retribution  that  only  arrives  to 
be  further  postponed,  and  in  that  restitution  of  all 
things  that  must  one  day  surely  come.  From  the  be- 
ginning of  the  world  nature  has  taught  the  sacrifice 
for  sin,  not  only  for  known  sin,  but  for  some  indefi- 
nite burden  pressing-  on  families,  nations,  and  the 
world.  From  nature  man  has  learnt  to  believe  in 
mysteries  of  which  he  can  but  touch  the  merest 
fringe.  From  her  he  has  learnt  to  believe  in  a  peo- 
pled air,  in  shadows  that  hover  over  the  tombs,  in 


406 


REMINISCENCES. 


spirits  that  soar  to  the  skies,  in  souls  that  wander 
through  the  dark  passages  of  the  earth,  or  crowd  the 
shores  of  the  hateful  stream,  or  that  live  in  rapture, 
or  in  agony  in  a  nether  world.  Nature  has  taught 
men  that  the  same  Power  which  exults  in  endless 
variety  of  creation,  and  ever  baffles  research,  may 
make  the  bread  that  perisheth  the  seed  of  eternal  as 
well  as  tempoi'al  life. 

So  vast  is  the  school  of  Nature,  so  various  her 
lessons,  so  numberless  the  institutions  founded  upon 
them,  and  so  inveterate  the  fond  beliefs  of  man,  that 
Pagan  and  Christian  philosophers  have  alike  ex- 
hausted all  their  art,  and  labored  still  in  vain,  to 
nip  faith  in  tlie  very  bud  and  extinguisli  natural 
religion.  Conyers  Middleton  has  proved  beyond  a 
doubt  the  identity  of  all  that  we  in  England  call 
Roman  Catholicism  with  Paganism.  The  ideas,  the 
sentiments,  the  very  objects,  the  rites  and  ceremonies, 
all  substantially  the  same.  So  far  it  may  be  said 
that  the  Church,  when  it  went  into  the  rude  village 
populations,  adopted  their  pagan  faiths  and  observ- 
ances. But  then  arises  the  question  whether  these 
Pagan  faiths  and  customs  are  utterly  wrong,  without 
foundation,  without  benefit. 

If  the  family  likeness  between  Paganism  and 
mediseval  Christianity  is  to  be  held  fatal  to  the  lat- 
ter, that  argument  goes  very  far.  The  whole  of 
Christianity  comes  under  the  condemnation.  Con- 
yers Middleton,  like  many  other  writers  before  and 
after  his  time,  only  went  to  a  certain  point,  but  he 
implanted  in  a  congenial  reader  an  impetus  which 
carried  him  much  further.  The  Creation,  the  Incar- 
nation, the  Atonement,  the  Resurrection,  the  Ascen- 
sion, the  glories  of  Heaven,  the  Judgment  Day,  are 
all  Pagan  ideas.    Are  they  therefore  incredible  ? 


WHERE  LANDED. 


407 


The  elder  dispensation  left  much  to  the  personal 
piety  and  private  opinion  of  the  very  various  citizens 
of  the  Jewish  Commonwealth.  They  might  believe 
or  not  in  a  future  state  and  a  judgment  to  come. 
They  might  believe  or  not  in  a  Divine  Presence  —  at 
least  it  is  certain  only  some  did  believe  in  it.  They 
might  believe  or  not  in  a  Divine  Victim,  in  a  Heaven- 
sent King,  and  a  suffering  Messiah.  They  were  per- 
mitted to  exercise  their  own  choice  between  a  The- 
ocracy and  a  Monarchy  of  the  vulgar  earthl}'  pattern. 

No  theology,  even  with  the  encouragement  and 
assistance  of  philosophy,  can  define  what  is  necessary 
to  a  good  moral  faith  and  what  is  inconsistent  with 
it.  A  wide  range  will  ever  remain  for  the  exercise  of 
private  judgment,  which  in  its  negative  capacity  is 
belauded  as  the  most  valuable  of  liberty's  preroga- 
tives. I,  too,  am  a  citizen  of  no  mean  city.  I,  too, 
claim  the  right  to  exercise  my  private  judgment 
wherever  Nature  speaks  and  Scripture  leaves  me 
free.  All  around  me  are  engaged  in  bold  investi- 
gations. If  investigation  is  not  to  imply  a  foregone 
conclusion,  I  am  ready  to  take  my  part  in  it,  but  I 
am  not  ready  to  pretend  inquiry,  with  an  intention  to 
reject  and  disbelieve. 


ADDENDA. 


Vol.  i.  page  12. 

I  see  it  stated  that  the  Newmans  resided  for  a  time 
in  Bloomsbury  Square,  and  that  in  that  way  the  future 
Cardinal  and  the  future  Premier,  Lord  Beaconsfield. 
may  have  been  playmates.  The  difference  between 
ten  years  of  age  and  six  years  of  age  would  not  sig- 
nify, for  Disraeli  was  a  singularly  precocious  and  en- 
gaging child.  The  house  occupied  by  the  Newmans 
for  some  years  was  No.  17,  Southampton  Street, 
Bloomsbury  Square.  Had  I  inquired  more,  or  remem- 
bered better,  I  might  have  been  able  to  say  more  of 
early  family  acquaintances.  The  chief  names  I  do 
remember  are  IVIr.  IMullins,  Mr.  Levy,  Mr.  Capel, 
and  Mr.  Ellis  of  the  Bank  of  England.  The  first  was 
a  blind  clergyman,  a  good  scholar,  a  good  preachei", 
and  a  kind  friend.  He  had  surmounted  his  diiBculties 
sufficiently  to  be  able  to  say  from  memory  the  whole 
of  the  Church  Services,  including  the  Psalms,  and  to 
talk  well  on  the  topics  of  the  day.  But,  strange  to 
say,  he  had  not  learnt  resignation,  and  he  felt  his 
infirmity  with  keenness  and  even  bitterness  to  his 
death.  Such  people  are  rather  to  be  pitied  than 
blamed.  In  all  the  ranks  of  industry  there  are  those 
who  labor  and  groan,  and  who  will  endure,  so  long  as 
they  be  allowed  to  vent  their  accumulated  griefs  now 


ADDENDA. 


409 


and  then.  Their  spirit  is  sufficient  to  give  nerve  to 
their  working  frames,  but  not  to  give  wings  to  their 
souls  or  cheerfulness  to  their  tongues.  Mr.  Levy  was, 
I  think,  on  the  Stock  Exchange,  a  man  of  high  literary 
attainments,  and  an  accomplished  musician.  At  a 
later  date  he  occupied  a  house  on  the  west  side  of 
Russell  Square.  Upon  his  death,  and  the  consequent 
sale  of  his  effects,  about  1848,  I  bought  one  of  his 
dinner  services  as  a  memento  of  the  Newman  acquaint- 
ance, and,  for  a  friend  of  mine,  bid  up  to  a  hundred 
guineas  for  a  fine  organ. 

Vol.  i.  page  23. 

William  James  Coploston  was  nephew  of  the 
Bishop  of  Llandaff,  and  uncle  of  the  present  Bishop 
of  Colombo.  He  will  be  long  remembered  by  Oriel 
men  for  his  useful  and  agreeable  qualities,  but  chieily 
for  the  light  and  pleasant  way  in  which  he  bore  what 
really  was  a  great  trouble  and  inconvenience.  One 
of  his  legs  had  always  been  dwindled,  useless,  and 
liable  to  painful  sores  affecting  the  whole  system. 
The  doctors  at  last  told  him  frankly  he  had  better 
have  it  off.  Without  saying  a  word  to  anybody  he 
went  up  to  town,  and  wrote  in  a  few  days  to  say  that 
he  had  had  the  operation  performed.  I  believe  the 
amputation  was  very  high  up.  Fi'om  that  time  he 
was  always  having  new  cork  legs,  costing  a  good  deal. 
He  walked  as  a  lame  man,  not  worse  ;  and  rode  like 
other  people.  Upon  the  whole  he  managed  so  well 
that  people  did  not  always  remember  his  mutilated 
state.  Denison  one  day  said,  "  Coplest(m,  don't  you 
find  your  ankles  ache  this  cold  weather?  "  He  replied, 
"  I 'm  thankful  to  say  I  don't,  fur  I 've  six  of  them." 
His  horse  fell  with  him  on  Burlington  Green.  Some 


410 


REMINISCENCES. 


one  coming  up  found  him  lying  on  the  turf  with  a  leg 
under  the  animal,  and  was  horror  struck.  "  Is  n't  your 
leg  crushed  ?  "  "I  hope  not,"  Copleston  replied,  "  for 
it  cost  me  thirty  guineas."  He  was  always  so  cheerful 
that  I  could  scarcely  say  there  ever  was  a  shade  of 
sadness  about  his  expression  ;  but  when  I  saw  him 
late  in  life  it  was  too  plain  that  he  had  gone  through 
a  good  deal  of  suffering.  As  a  conscientious  and  pains- 
taking man  he  would  not  spare  himself  in  his  duties 
as  Rector  of  Cromhall,  and  would  no  doubt  suffer  in 
consequence.  The  Copleston  family  has  remarkable 
qualities,  which  have  yet  perhaps  to  take  a  higher 
part  and  make  more  show.  Some  one  has  said  that 
genius  is  an  aptitude  for  taking  trouble  about  things, 
and  there  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  moral  part  of  our 
nature  contributes  to  its  formation  more  than  the 
intellectual.  The  very  qualities  which  in  the  opinion 
of  some  people  tend  to  stupidity  and  dulness,  such  as 
sympathy,  patience,  and  love  of  work,  have  the  largest 
share  in  the  development  of  the  higher  faculties,  which 
really  are  stifled  without  them. 

Vol.  i.page  30. 

Copleston's  Lectures  or  Prelections  on  Poetry  are 
a  great  classical  work,  in  a  language  which  few  can 
read  without  more  labor  and  time  than  the  pace  of 
life  now  allows.  Why  have  they  not  been  translated  ? 
Even  Copleston  had  to  complain  latterly  of  the  vacua 
subsilia  before  him.  Milman  smuggled  into  his 
Lectures  his  own  English  translations  of  the  choruses 
in  Aristophanes  and  other  bits,  and  in  this  way  secured 
good  audiences.  His  delivery  told  as  much  as  the 
translations  themselves.  Keble  overshot  the  mark  in 
his  extreme  desire  to  be  perfectly  distinct  and  intel- 


ADDENDA. 


411 


ligible.  He  made  such  pauses  at  all  the  stops  that 
he  broke  his  sentences  to  pieces,  and  put  so  many 
stumbling-blocks  in  the  way  of  attention.  I  remem- 
ber, however,  being  amused  as  well  as  interested  by 
his  claiming  Homer  as  the  poet  of  old  country  life, 
who  might  have  learnt  all  his  facts,  his  pedigrees,  and 
his  legends  from  persons  corresponding  to  the  old 
family  servants  left  in  great  houses  to  show  them  to 
strangers.  As  to  the  matter  of  Copleston's  Praelec- 
tions,  though  I  read  a  good  deal  of  them  with  New- 
man, I  have  to  confess  that  I  remember  best  what  at 
the  time  I  could  not  quite  agree  with,  and  have  since 
much  objected  to.  The  ancients,  Copleston  says,  had 
not  the  idea  of  the  picturesque.  They  do  not  describe 
objects  that  most  prove  the  skill  of  a  modern  painter. 
This  I  think  true  only  so  far  as  that  their  taste  for 
the  picturesque  was  less  developed  than  ours.  The 
taste  is  cultivated  by  the  painter,  not  the  sculptor. 
By  the  time  we  have  seen  many  houses,  trees,  gates, 
animals,  bridges,  roads,  or  what  not,  faithfully  repre- 
sented as  the  worst  of  their  kind,  and  in  the  worst 
possible  condition,  we  begin  to  admire  them  when  we 
see  them  in  matter  of  fact.  It  is  the  same  witli  singu- 
lar features  of  scenery.  But  a  scholar  may  easily 
collect  a  great  number  of  epithets  and  single  words  in 
the  classical  writers  that  at  once  bring  a  whole 
landscape  to  the  eye. 

Vol  i.  page  87. 

I  am  told  that  upon  hearing  of  the  College  de- 
cision, either  before  or  after  the  actual  dismissal,  the 
father  came  down  to  expostulate  with  Copleston,  and 
got  into  a  long  argument  with  him.  To  the  charge 
of  disgraceful  intoxication  he  replied  that  drunken- 


412 


BEMINISCENCES. 


iiess  was  not  necessarily  intoxication.  There  were 
four  kinds  of  intoxication,  and  it  was  possible  for  a 
man  to  be  drunk  neither  disgracefully  nor  injuriously. 
My  own  experience  is  that  it  is  a  great  mistake  to 
tell  people  drunkenness  will  make  them  fools  and 
poor  men.  In  one  parish  at  least  within  my  knowl- 
edge the  only  men  who  made  their  fortunes  and 
retained  their  natural  shrewdness  to  the  last  had 
never  been  known  to  be  quite  sober.  Drinking  de- 
graded them  and  made  them  knavish,  tricky,  selfish, 
and  generally  unprincipled,  but  did  not  prevent  them 
from  milking  their  way  in  the  world  and  being  even 
clever  talkers.  Drunkenness  puts  a  man  into  one 
long  dream  ;  but  if  that  one  dream  is  money-making, 
he  will  be  sharper  for  that  purpose  than  his  neighbor 
with  more  things  to  care  about. 

Vol.  i.  page  155. 

Among  other  morning  callers  at  Shrewsbury  was 
Dr.  Darwin,  father  of  Charles  R.  Darwin,  who  has 
just  closed  a  long  career  of  meritorious,  and,  as  far  as 
it  goes,  beneficial  work.  Dr.  Darwin  was,  I  think, 
the  biofcrest  man  I  ever  saw  out  of  a  show,  for  though 
not  so  tall  as  Carus  Wilson,  he  was  much  stouter. 
When  he  entered  the  room  it  was  like  the  door 
coming  upon  you  broadside  on.  Bat  what  most 
struck  me  was  the  small  soft  voice  that  proceeded 
from  this  mountain.  Erasmus,  so  I  used  to  hear, 
had  great  faith  in  the  instincts  of  even  the  human 
child,  enfeebled  and  vitiated  as  they  are  supposed  to 
have  been  b}'  civilization.  His  plan  was  to  let  his 
children  eat  and  drink  what  they  liked  ;  so  they  ate 
much  fruit  and  drank  bowls  of  cream.  The  general 
opinion  was  that  he  had  carried  this  too  far,  and  that 


ADDENDA. 


413 


it  had  told,  injuriously  on  the  constitutions  of  his 
children.  The  one  who  lived  and  died  at  Breadsall 
Priory,  near  Derby,  was  a  very  tall  fellow,  but  not 
unwieldy  or  over  stout. 

Vol.  i.  page  183. 

"  Themes  "  are  part  of  a  very  long  story  in  my  life, 
indeed  beginning  before  my  life.  In  a  question  upon 
■which  people  differ  even  to  soreness  I  will  give  some 
facts,  which  to  me  are  most  interesting.  But  it  is  a 
long  story,  and  it  is  not  a  few  pages  that  will  see  the 
end  of  it.  I  must  begin  at  Oriel.  Not  more  than 
a  dozen  of  the  undergraduates  took  pains  with  their 
"  themes."  At  least,  not  so  many  had  the  distinction 
of  reading  their  themes  in  hall.  The  readers  were 
myself,  John  F.  Christie,  Sackville  U.  S.  Lee,  now 
Canon  of  Exeter,  and  Francis  Trench,  elder  brother 
of  the  Arclibishop  of  Dublin.  I  am  doubtful  about 
Holford,  Sir  John  Duckworth,  Algernon  Perkins, 
J.  Richardson,  Charles  B.  Pearson,  and  some  others. 
They  might  have  read  in  hall  once  or  twice.  The 
tutor  had  to  overhaul  tlie  "  theme  "  before  it  was  read. 
Newman  never  flattered  me.  I  don't  think  he  ever 
gave  me  to  understand  that  I  had  a  good  style,  or 
any  style  at  all,  or  indeed  that  style  was  an  object 
in  a  theme.  He  used  rather  to  touch  my  amour 
propre  in  this  matter,  and  he  frequently  reminded  me 
that  Avhat  a  writer  thought  his  best  things  were 
generally  his  worst.  These  "  themes "  I  kept  for 
many  years,  and  I  never  looked  at  them  without 
being  deeply  impressed  with  the  truth  of  Newman's 
comments.  No  doubt  a  "  style  "  is  generally  an  af- 
fectation and  a  trick  ;  a  vehicle  for  paradoxes,  if  not 
the  disguise  of  nonsense.    No  sensible  tutor  would 


414 


REMINISCENCES. 


encourage  the  formation  of  a  style.  He  commonly 
finds  points  of  far  more  importance  to  insist  on. 

One  day,  after  reading  in  hall,  I  was  sent  for  by 
Provost  Copleston.  He  had  been  present  at  the 
reading.  I  should  say  that  he  had  always  shown  a 
kindly  interest  in  me  on  the  strength  of  Russell's 
recommendation.  On  this  occasion  he  at  once  asked 
when,  and  how,  I  had  acquired  my  style.  What 
practice  had  I  had  ?  I  could  only  reply.  School- 
themes  and  letter-writing.  Who  had  been  my  fa- 
vorite author  ?  I  am  pretty  sure  that  this  question 
was  suggested  by  Copleston's  very  acute  and  prac- 
tised ear  detecting  an  eighteenth-century  ring  about 
my  compositions.  My  answer  was  like  too  many 
answers  I  have  given  in  my  life.  It  was  truth,  but 
not  the  whole  truth,  or  the  most  important  part  of 
the  truth.  I  said,  "  The  '  Spectator.'  "  I  certainly 
had  read  it  more  than  any  other  English  classic,  but 
the  book  which  I  had  returned  to  over  and  over  again, 
and  read  every  page  of,  was  not  likely  to  be  known 
to  Copleston,  any  more  than  to  my  readers.  It  was 
the  "  Country  Spectator."  My  special  interest  in  the 
book,  and  the  singularity  of  the  story,  as  well  as  the 
length  of  it,  would  have  made  it  scarcely  possible  for 
me  to  do  justice  to  myself  had  I  answered  the  above 
question  with  entire  and  literal  truth. 

I  must  now  go  back  a  long  way.  In  the  decade 
before  the  French  Revolution  there  were  three  Blue- 
Coat  School  boys  enjoying  at  the  same  time  the 
closest  intimacy  and  unique  educational  advantages. 
These  were  Thomas  Fanshawe  Middleton,  Charles 
Lamb,  and  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge.  The  first  of 
these  was  senior  in  school  standing  by  about  two 
years,  but  they  were  all  there  together  five  years. 


ADDENDA. 


415 


They  were  of  a  very  small  class  of  Grecians,  and 
they  had  a  master  to  themselves.  He  was  a  man  of 
learning  and  taste,  who  read  and  did  what  he  pleased 
with  his  handful  of  pupils,  as  they  might  be  called  ; 
taking  it  easy  and  giving  them  easy  times;  consulting 
their  taste  for  novelty,  and  feeding  them,  as  it  were 
from  hand  to  mouth,  with  a  bit  of  this  favorite 
author,  and  then  a  bit  of  that.  The  master  of  the 
lower  school  was  much  the  same  sort  of  gentleman 
in  his  way,  doing  what  he  liked,  and  letting  the  boys 
do  much  as  they  liked.  Nobody  wished  the  boys  of 
the  lower  school  to  be  educated  above  the  requii'e- 
ments  of  the  counter  or  the  desk.  Middleton  went 
to  Cambridge,  leaving  his  friends  at  the  school.  Im- 
mediately upon  taking  his  degree  he  was  ordained  to 
the  curacy  of  Gainsbro'.  On  arriving  there  he  at 
once  made  the  acquaintance  of  my  father,  and  in  a 
very  short  time  started  a  weekly  sheet  with  the  title 
of  the  "  Country  Spectator."  My  father  was  then 
only  nineteen.  At  the  age  of  fifteen  he  had  been 
brought  home  from  Kirton  Grammar  School,  to  the 
great  grief  of  his  master,  to  succeed  his  own  grand- 
father in  the  management  of  a  very  important  busi- 
ness. He  had  the  confidence  and  kindest  wishes  of 
the  town,  for  the  grandfather  had  been  for  many 
years  one  of  its  most  useful  and  popular  men ;  though 
not  a  lawyer  by  profession,  much  employed  to  ar- 
bitrate, compose  difficulties,  and  make  wills.  My 
father  must  have  been,  what  he  always  was,  a  very 
pleasant  companion,  and  Middleton  was  with  him 
every  day,  calling  him  "  Harry,"  and  making  a 
schoolfellow  of  him.  He  freely  disclosed  to  my  father 
his  feelings  about  the  townspeople,  especially  where 
he  felt  he  did  not  receive  the  consideration  he  de- 


416 


REMINISCENCES. 


served  ;  and  affectionate  as  he  was  to  my  father,  the 
impression  he  left  was  that  he  was  generally  stiff  and 
prond. 

Of  course  I  should  be  gratified  to  be  able  to  detect 
that  my  father  had  some  hand  in  the  work.  But  I 
cannot.  On  the  contrary  I  feel  very  sure  that  Mid- 
dleton  brought  the  idea,  the  thoughts,  the  characters, 
and  everything  short  of  the  MS.,  from  Cambridge, 
or  from  some  vacation  experiences,  or  from  even  an 
earlier  stage  of  his  existence.  The  characters  don't 
fit  into  Galnsbro',  which  is  a  tidal  river  port,  much 
given  to  speculation  in  Baltic  produce,  and  not  an 
ordinary  country  town.  I  remember  the  place  per- 
fectly well  as  it  was  only  twenty  years  after  Middle- 
ton's  time,  and  as  I  write  this  I  can  recall  the  sound 
of  the  "  Mill  on  the  Floss,"  and  a  good  deal  more. 
Middleton  had  some  local  contributors,  and  he  may 
have  adapted  his  old  stores  to  the  circumstances  of 
the  place.  But  one  thing  is  conclusive  as  to  the  long 
incubation  of  the  work.  The  first  number  is  that  of 
October  9,  1792,  and  the  thirty-third  and  last  is  that 
of  Mav  21,  1793.  Throuo-hout  the  whole  series  there 
is  not  the  slightest  allusion  to  the  terrible  events  at 
the  neighboring  capital.  Everything,  too,  indicates 
that  the  writer  had  expected  to  be  located  in  a  vil- 
lage or  some  small  market  town.  I  should  say  that 
the  whole  work  is  an  echo  of  Addison  and  Steele, 
that  had  been  for  many  years  growing  into  shape, 
and  that  the  writer  could  not  now  get  rid  of  it  except 
by  publication.  It  is,  however,  a  charming  book.  I 
believe  I  read  it  with  more  pleasure  than  the  "  Spec- 
tator "  itself.  It  was  my  earliest  idea  of  good  writ- 
ing. It  seemed  to  have  an  intrinsic  value.  Such 
was  my  appreciation  of  it  that  in  my  frequent  pecu- 


ADDENDA. 


417 


niary  distresses  at  school,  a  dreadful  thought  used  to 
occur  to  me.  As  the  book  was  almost  unknown,  I 
thought  1  might  safely  copy  sonae  of  the  papers  and 
obtain  something  considerable  by  the  sale  to  a  peri- 
odical. Nothing  would  ever  have  induced  me  to  do 
that.  It  was  a  wicked  thought,  and  no  more.  But  it 
shows  my  opinion  of  the  book.  I  regard  it  as  a  tra- 
dition of  the  "  Spectator,"  and  I  have  to  thank  it  for 
bringing  the  "  Spectator  "  home  to  me. 

The  "  Country  Spectator  "  was,  as  they  say,  the 
making  of  Middleton.  The  religious  biographers 
make  a  good  story  of  Toniline,  then  Bishop  of  Lin- 
coln, hearing  of  his  faithful  discharge  of  his  parish 
duties,  and  resolving  to  promote  him  to  a  larger 
sphere.  The  fact  is  he  saw  some  numbers  of  the 
"  Country  Spectator,"  and  at  once  laid  hold  of  the 
writer  and  sent  him  to  Norwich  to  take  charge  of 
two  nephews.  In  due  time  he  gave  him  church  pre- 
ferment. I  can  remember  that  even  at  the  age  of 
eleven,  at  my  Derby  day-school,  despairing  of  other 
success,  I  was  pining  for  the  opportunity  of  essay 
writing.  This  and  the  usual  paper  work  was  the 
most  I  did  at  Charterhouse.  I  was  the  only  one  of 
all  our  family  who  took  to  the  "  Country  Spectator," 
or  realized  its  existence.  Yet  several  of  the  family 
must  have  felt,  without  knowing  it,  a  sort  of  under- 
current or  electric  wave  coming  through  INIiddleton 
from  the  sweet  little  coterie  at  Christ's  Hospital,  foi', 
from  very  early  years,  they  enjoyed  no  writer  so 
much  as  Charles  Lamb. 

I  must  confess  to  a  certain  fascination  in  tracing 
the  threads  of  moral  and  mental  influence,  be  they 
silver,  gold,  silk,  or  some  common  fibre.  Surely,  in 
these  may  be  seen  the  hand  of  the  Almighty  ever 

vor,.  II.  27 


418 


REMINISCENCES. 


preparing  His  servants  for  their  appointed  work.  It 
is  their  very  nature  to  escape  vulgar  eyes,  and  be 
only  known,  or  best  known,  by  those  who  are  most 
concerned.  Very  trifling  incidents  indeed,  that  might 
easily  pass  unnoticed,  have  affected  my  course  ;  some, 
indeed,  my  existence.  I  am  thankful  that  I  was  born 
at  a  place  which  contributed  to  me  very  early  experi- 
ences in  the  lines  of  my  future  occupations.  In  my 
childhood  I  used  to  walk  down  the  Trent  to  meet  the 
"  Egre  "  or  "  Bore,"  as  it  is  called,  in  the  Severn.  I 
used  to  watch  the  building  of  ships  and  see  them 
launched ;  in  particular  the  Trent,  one  of  the  first 
vessels  sent  this  century  on  an  Arctic  expedition.  I 
remember  seeing  an  iron  bridge  shipped  for  Calcutta, 
and  cannon  balls  for  our  wanton  and  abortive  land- 
ings in  the  United  States  in  1813-14.  I  remember  the 
Pressgang,  the  Volunteers,  and  the  rejoicings  for  our 
Peninsular  victories.  I  early  ranged  about  the  Old 
Hall  ascribed  to  John  of  Gaunt,  and  heard  of  sad 
stories  connected  with  it.  Before  the  days  of  steam, 
after  witnessing  a  tremendous  storm  at  Bridlington,  I 
passed  a  night  and  was  nearly  wrecked  on  the  mud 
banks  of  Trent  Fall  up  the  H umber.  I  saw  the  ar- 
rival of  the  first  steamer  that  ever  came  up  those 
waters,  and  a  very  clumsy  affair  it  was.  Besides 
events  nearer  home,  I  heard  the  newspapers  read  as 
they  brought  news  of  Waterloo  ;  and  very  soon  after 
that  was  initiated  into  the  difficulties  then  besetting 
home  government.  Even  my  infancy  was  amongst  in- 
genious and  good-natured  people.  To  a  nursery  com- 
panion of  mine  a  very  competent  authority  ascribes 
the  invention  upon  which  the  concertina  and  the 
harmonium  are  based.  From  a  child  I  was  a  good 
listener,  if  there  was  anything  to  attract  attention. 


ADDENDA. 


419 


My  father  saw  many  of  the  people  connected  with 
the  trade  and  enterprise  of  the  town.  In  this  way  I 
used  to  hear  a  good  deal  of  the  whale  fishery,  many 
Gainsbro'  people  having  sliares  in  whalers  or  rela- 
tives on  board.  Nothing  then  did  I  long  for  so  much 
as  a  chance  of  an  encounter  with  a  whale.  I  used  to 
hear  also  of  a  less  recognized  but  still  common  in- 
dustry ;  that  is,  chartering  rotten  ships  and  sending 
them  into  the  Baltic  heavily  insured,  to  sink  or  swim 
as  might  be.  Then  I  heard  of  the  vast  "  warping  " 
operations  ;  that  is,  the  reclamation  of  marshy  land 
irregularly  flooded  by  the  Trent,  by  allowing  the  tide 
to  enter,  deposit  its  rich  mud,  and  then  quietly  retire 
till  wanted  again.  More,  much  more  could  I  say, 
but  one  thing  only  will  I  add.  A  lingering  attach- 
ment for  a  young  lady  brought  home  an  Indian  chap- 
lain, who  remained  in  England,  and  by  whose  advice 
my  father  sent  me  to  Charterhouse,  and  then  asked 
Russell  to  obtain  my  admission  into  Oriel.  The  evo- 
lutionist will  allow  that  these  things  have  been  op- 
portune for  me,  and  he  is  not  in  a  condition  to  dis- 
pute that  they  may  have  been  providentially  ordered 
and  controlled.  Slow  as  I  am  in  the  powers  of  ac- 
quisition and  expression,  I  never  could  have  done 
anything  without  the  timely  and  abundant  aid  of 
surrounding  circumstances,  interpreted  frequently  by 
a  parent  who  early  regarded  me  with  a  special  inter- 
est and  more  than  my  due  share  of  affection. 

Vol.  i.  page  302. 

On  consulting  Fei'gusson's  works,  I  find  I  must 
qualify  what  I  have  said  in  the  comparison  of  the  cir- 
cular curve  with  the  catenary  in  the  matter  of  domes. 
The  inner  dome  of  St.  Peter's  is  no  more  spherical 


420 


REinNISCEXCES. 


than  the  outer ;  indeed  the  only  difEerence  between 
them  is  that  the  outer  dome  is  larger,  and  rises  from 
a  base  three  or  four  vavds  higher.  Fergusson's  il- 
lustrations  are  not  quite  large  enough  for  exact 
measurement  and  calculation,  but  so  far  as  I  can  es- 
timate, the  curve  is  obtained  by  dividing  the  diame- 
ter at  the  base  or  spring  of  the  dome  into  three  equal 
parts,  and  making  the  dividing  points  the  two  cen- 
tres. Tliis  forms  a  Gothic  arch  of  a  very  ordinary 
chai-acter,  but  interrupted  by  the  "  eye,"  or  aperture 
for  the  cupola.  The  arch  is  that  which  runs  through 
AVestminster  Hall,  appearing  in  a  very  grand  form 
in  the  timber  roof,  and  in  all  the  windows.  If  one 
can  imagine  the  great  window  over  the  north,  or 
principal  entrance,  revolving  round  a  perpendicular 
dropped  from  the  point  of  the  arch,  that  will  give  the 
very  form  of  the  double  dome  of  St.  Peter's.  As  the 
two  domes  are  rigidly  connected  at  the  cupola,  the  re- 
sulting curve,  in  the  matter  of  forces,  is  a  very  com- 
plex problem.  But  the  domes  approach  the  spher- 
ical form  too  nearly  to  support  the  cupola  a  second 
without  an  abundance  of  metal  ties.  The  dome  of 
Sta.  Sophia,  at  Constantinople,  as  well  as  the  much 
smaller  dome  of  the  ancient  building  called  the  Les- 
ser Sophia,  is  spherical,  but  very  far  short  of  a  whole 
hemisphere.  The  centre  of  the  dome  is  three  or 
four  yards  below  its  actual  base  or  spring  line.  The 
curvature  thus  leaves  the  walls  at  a  great  angle. 
Such  a  dome  is  quite  safe,  but  it  must  spring  from  a 
firm  base  secured  by  strong  ties  or  by  ver}"  heavy 
abutments,  the  latter  being  employed  in  this  case,  as 
one  sees  in  the  familiar  photographs  of  the  exterior. 
Every  bit  of  masonry  in  the  building,  every  wall, 
every  vault,  is  made  to  contribute  to  this  abutment. 


ADDENDA. 


421 


Early  in  1833,  Hurrell  Froude  was  some  weeks  at 
Malta,  from  which  he  went  to  Rome,  and  immedi- 
ately set  to  work  studying  the  Pantheon,  especially  as 
to  its  economical  conditions.  At  that  very  time,  as 
I  now  read  in  Fergusson,  a  village  mason,  with  the 
aid  of  a  local  architect,  was  about  to  put  in  execution 
a  long-designed  and  long-preiDared  plan  for  a  church, 
at  Mousta,  a  walk  from  Valetta,  which  was  completed 
in  18G0,  and  which  Fergusson  classes  as  the  third 
dome  in  Europe.  It  was  built  without  scaffolding, 
and  over  the  existing  church,  which  was  not  removed 
till  the  new  church  was  completed.  The  mason  and 
the  architect  must  have  been  well  acquainted  with 
the  domes  of  the  Pantheon,  Sta.  Sophia,  and  St. 
Peter's,  for  they  have  improved  upon  all  three.  For 
safety,  and  economy  of  material,  they  have  avoided 
the  spherical  form.  As  at  St.  Peter's,  they  have  ob- 
tained the  required  curvature  by  describing  it  from 
two  centres,  dividing  the  diameter  of  the  dome  into 
three  equal  parts.  At  Sta.  Sophia,  as  above  stated, 
the  true  centre  of  the  dome  is  three  or  four  yards  be- 
low its  actual  base,  and  at  Mousta,  the  two  centres 
are  about  that  much  below  it.  The  village  mason 
very  wisely  dispensed  with  a  cupola,  and  provided  an 
immense  quantity  of  abutment.  Under  the  circum- 
stances it  is  a  prodigious  achievement.  If  Froude 
did  not  hear  of  the  design,  the  fact  of  his  head  run- 
ning so  soon  on  a  very  similar  modification  of  the 
Pantheon,  is  one  of  those  instances  of  ideas  "  in  the 
air "  that  everybody  has  often  experienced.  The 
building  itself  was  only  commenced  that  year,  but 
Froude  might  have  seen  the  drawings  for  it,  which 
had  been  many  jears  in  preparation.  He  might  at 
least  have  heard  the  talk  about  it.    Froude  observes 


422 


REMINISCENCES. 


on  the  stones  being  laid  horizontally  on  the  dome  of 
St.  Peter's,  as  in  the  building  of  a  common  wall. 
Tliat  might  be  to  avoid  the  necessity  of  scaffolding. 
At  Mousta,  Fergnsson  says,  each  successive  course  is 
notched  on  to  the  course  below. 

Vol.  a.  page  37. 

The  fact  of  so  many  men  of  great  power  and  high 
promise  suddenly  relinquisliiiig  the  wide  field  of  lit- 
erature and  philosophy  for  the  narrow  path  of  the- 
ology, of  a  more  or  less  polemical  character,  has 
hardly  yet  been  duly  and  accurately  estimated.  The 
gain  is  before  the  world  in  the  copious  library  of  the 
Oxford  movement  in  all  its  stages  and  branches. 
What  has  been  the  loss  ?  "  Very  great,"  will  per- 
haps be  the  answer.  But  then  comts  the  question, 
who  is  answerable  for  the  loss  ?  They  that  did  not 
join  the  movement  were  far  more  numerous  than  they 
that  did.  Till  the  appearance  of  the  "  Tracts  for  the 
Times,"  in  autumn,  18o3,  there  was  nothing  to  distract 
general  attention  from  the  studies  of  the  University 
such  as  they  were  at  that  time.  There  were  then 
man}'  thousands  of  Oxford  men  all  over  England,  still 
comparatively  fresh  from  Oxford,  and  full  of  its  cul- 
ture. These  men  had  brought  with  them  to  Oxford 
the  special  tastes  and  mental  discipline  of  many  great 
schools,  conducted  by  the  best  scholars  of  the  day. 
They  had  been  well  drilled  in  all  the  Greek  and  Latin 
poets  —  epic,  lyric,  and  dramatic;  in  liistorians  and 
philosophers,  in  antiquities  and  in  criticism,  in  com- 
position, in  philology,  and  in  ethnology.  I  remember 
1  egarding  with  something  like  awe  the  knowledge  this 
man  had  of  Homer,  another  of  Greek  plays,  another 
of  Cicero's  Letters,  another  of  Herodotus  or  of  Livy, 


ADDENDA. 


423 


another  of  Terence.  They  were  really  familiar  with 
these  authors,  and  could  quote  them  largely.  The 
greater  part  of  these  men  carried  their  literary  ac- 
quirements to  spheres  where  there  was  nothing  to 
curtail  their  free  development  and  full  use.  Imme- 
diately after  that  date  there  ensued  an  immense 
extension  of  our  scholastic  system  in  the  same  lines 
as  the  old,  with  the  same  course  of  classical  and 
mathematical  studies.  It  cannot  be  said,  then,  that 
classical  literature  has  not  had  a  fair  field,  and  its  full 
share  of  golden  opportunities.  I  have  lately  heai'd  it 
estimated  tliat  there  are  now  ten  scholars  to  one  in 
the  comparison  with  the  last  generation  but  one.  But 
what  has  this  scholarshijj  done  ?  What  results  has  it 
to  show  ?  The  poetry,  the  philosophy,  the  politics  of 
the  country  have  generally  left  tlie  old  "classical  mod- 
els. The  lines  of  thought  have  ceased  to  be  classical. 
The  chief  arena  of  the  country  has  been  Parliament, 
and  if  classical  ideas  and  classical  allusions  could  still 
emerge  and  hold  their  ground,  it  would  be  there. 
For  years  and  years  the  best,  or  at  least  the  most 
popular  and  the  most  powerful,  scholars  in  the  coun- 
try did  their  very  best  to  keep  up  the  pleasant  old 
freemasonry  of  classical  thought  and  illustration. 
That  very  best  consisted  in  the  annual  use  of  some 
hundred  quotations,  every  one  of  them  familiar  to 
even  a  fifth-rate  scholar,  who  would  not  even  call 
himself  a  scholar.  Scores  of  men  ranging  free  over 
the  whole  surface  of  literature,  with  the  aid  of  ex- 
cellent libraries,  could  not  produce  at  the  most  more 
than  half  a  dozen  new  quotations  a  year.  The  ex- 
hibition became  disgraceful.  Lord  Sherbrooke  pro- 
nounced classical  litei'ature  self-condemned,  obsolete, 
and  no  longer  suited  to  English  wants  or  theJEnglish 


424 


REMIXISCENCES. 


character.  As  the  Muses  could  not  be  entirely 
banished  from  the  society  of  gentlemen,  he  tried  old 
English  ballads  instead.  Why  he  gave  that  up  he 
best  can  say.  The  final  result  is  that  the  classical 
quotation,  illustration,  or  allusion  is  gone.  A  great 
statesman,  strong  enough  to  do  and  to  say  anything, 
now  and  then  brings  up  a  quotation  from  some  un- 
known depth,  but  the  c-lassical  vein  has  been  worked 
out.  Never  was  there  so  much  classical  education, 
and  never  was  there  so  little  to  show  for  it,  or  so  few 
who  could  be  called  good  ripe  schohirs. 

Vol.  a.  pages  217,  218. 

I  will  venture  to  add  here  several  phenomena  of 
the  skies  above  that  have  much  impressed  me  in 
different  ways.  Of  the  first  phenomenon  I  have  to 
say  that  I  did  not  see  it ;  nevertheless,  what  hap- 
pened told  on  me  as  much  as  if  I  had.  In  the  spring 
of  1820  there  was  to  be  a  great  eclipse,  beginning 
about  noon.  We  were  released  early  from  school 
that  we  might  observe  it  with  due  preparation.  I 
had  half  an  hour  or  so  to  wait.  Sitting  down  in  my 
father's  library,  with  my  back  to  the  book-case,  I 
dived  with  my  hand  backwards  into  the  shelves  and 
took  out  a  volume  which  turned  out  to  be  a  very  old 
number  of  the  "  Monthly  Review."  I  opened  it  at 
random,  when  the  first  words  that  caught  my  eye 
were,  "  If  any  one  of  the  present  generation  should 
live  to  see  the  great  eclipsp  of  1820,  he  will  have  the 
opportunity  of  observing,"  etc.  The  writer  went  on 
to  describe  the  "  beads,"  the  "  flames,"  the  "  protu- 
berances," and  the  "  corona,"  since  more  accurately 
ascertained.  Now,  with  our  common  telescope  and 
our  siiioked  glass  we  were  not  likely  to  make  out 


ADDENDA. 


425 


these  objects,  and  we  did  not.  So,  assuming  the 
■vrarning  to  be  providential,  what  did  it  mean  ?  As  I 
had  not  the  appliances,  and  could  not  do  the  very 
biddintj,  it  did  not  seem  intended  to  make  me  an 
astronomer.  What  then  did  it  mean  ?  I  can  only 
say  that  it  made  a  very  deep  impression  on  me,  and 
that  was  that  He  that  ruleth  in  the  heavens  was 
then  very  near  to  me,  and  that  He  guided  my  hand 
and  opened  that  book,  and  thereby  assured  me  of  His 
constant  presence  and  aid. 

The  next  phenomenon  I  did  see,  and  when  I  read 
that  the  strongest  and  bravest  men  are  unnerved  by 
an  earthquake,  I  am  not  ashamed  to  confess  that  for 
a  few  seconds  I  was  myself  in  that  condition.  Some 
of  us  were  at  the  Waylands,  at  Bassingham,  and 
there  was  a  comet  to  be  seen,  if  we  could  only  find 
it.  We  stayed  very  late  in  the  garden,  taking  our 
stations  before  the  different  windows  to  scan  the 
heavens  all  round.  The  servants  knew  what  we  were 
about.  As  the  search  was  fruitless  we  went  indoors. 
Before  tea  was  over  the  servants  rushed  in  to  say  the 
comet  was  come.  We  all  ran  out,  and  there,  right 
across  the  blue  sky,  from  the  east  horizon  to  tlie 
west,  was  a  broad  arch  as  white  and  almost  as  bright 
as  the  full  moon.  For  some  seconds  or  breathings,  if 
I  breathed,  I  felt  that  this  was  coming  down  upon  us, 
with  what  results  one  could  only  tremble  to  think  of. 
It  remained  and  was  harmless.  It  was  a  "  northern 
light,"  and  nothing  more;  but  the  momentary  im- 
pression remains  to  this  day,  after  more  than  half  a 
century. 

Twenty-one  years  ago  I  had  the  converse  expe- 
rience, for  I  was  in  the  tail  of  a  comet,  without 
knowing  it,  though  noting  the  effects,  which  were 


426 


REMINISCENCES. 


very  remarkiible.  T  and  my  wife  were  at  Paris  on 
Sunday,  June  30, 1861.  We  liad  dined  with  friends, 
and  they  took  us  a  drive  on  the  Bois  de  Boulogne. 
I  sat  by  the  driver  that  I  might  h)ok  about  me.  The 
hour  was  not  late,  and  I  was  struck  by  finding  night 
closing  in.  There  was  a  murkiness  in  the  atmosphere 
not  like  a  summer  evening.  Looking  towards  Paris 
I  was  surprised  to  see  a  brilliant  primrose,  or  rather 
gamboge,  light  over  the  horizon.  Considering  and 
disposing  of  several  solutions,  I  settled  at  last  that  it 
might  be  the  illumination  of  some  public  gardens,  but 
I  was  not  satisfied  with  that.  In  the  midst  of  this 
bi'illiancy,  and  outshining  it,  was  a  flaming  torch  of 
this  yellow  liglit,  \ery  little  above  the  horizon.  What 
could  it  be  ?  There  was  no  evening  star,  even  if  that 
bad  been  the  direction  for  it.  Was  it  a  fire  balloon? 
But  it  had  no  perceptible  motion.  I  kept  entreating 
the  attention  of  the  gentleman  and  two  ladies  in  the 
carriage  to  these  unaccountable  appearances,  but  with 
the  result  that  has  uniformly  attended  similar  at- 
tempts. One  of  the  most  entertaining  gentlemen 
in  the  world  was  there,  and  what  could  the  skies 
show  in  comparison  ?  I  think  it  was  only  on  Tuesday 
morning  that  I  saw  by  the  English  papers  that  this 
was  a  comet,  and  that  we  had  probably  been  passing 
through  its  tail.  This,  too,  has  left  a  strong  imj^res- 
sion  upon  me.  It  is  not  the  fear  of  collision  or  com- 
bustion ;  for  this  particular  experience  rather  goes  to 
show  that  comets  are  harmless  things.  It  suggests 
to  me  the  infinite  treasury  of  new  forces  at  the  com- 
mand of  Omnipotent  Wisdom.  Who  knows  what 
mj'sterious  yet  powerful  elements  may  not  have  been 
contributed  by  this  sudden,  near,  yet  almost  unnoticed 
visitor  ? 


ADDENDA. 


427 


I  have  had  a  similar  experience  of  an  earthquake  ; 
that  is  with  a  clear  perception  of  the  effect,  without 
even  guessing  the  cause.  We  were  at  Grindelwald  in 
1851,  in  the  same  hotel  as  Bishop  Wilberforce. 
There  was  not  room  for  me  to  sleep  at  the  hotel,  and 
I  w<is  sent  to  the  minister,  whose  maid-servant  under- 
stood the  arrangement  and  conducted  me  to  my  bed- 
room. I  had  just  got  into  bed  when  there  was  a 
knocking  at  the  door.  I  must  pay  my  two  francs 
down,  the  minister  having  frequently  lost  it  through 
the  carelessness  of  the  hotel  people.  I  had  notliing 
but  sovereigns  about  me,  and  it  was  only  after  a  long 
negotiation  that  the  minister  consented  to  take  a 
sovereign  in  pawn.  By  tliis  time  I  had  become  aware 
of  the  fact  that  there  was  a  baby  in  the  house.  In 
the  middle  of  the  niglit  I  was  waked  by  a  movement 
that  I  could  only  compare  to  the  brandishing  of  a 
sword  or  the  flicker  of  a  flame.  My  first  idea  was 
that  a  whirlwind  had  caught  the  house,  or  some  vio- 
lent gust.  I  opened  the  window,  and  all  was  still.  It 
was  a  calm  moonlight  night.  Then  I  thought  of  an 
avalanche.  At  last  I  settled  down  to  the  conclusion 
that  the  minister's  baby  had  fallen  out  of  bed.  When 
morning  came,  however,  I  examined  the  walls  and 
ceiling  for  cracks,  and  found  none.  At  dinner  people 
were  talking  of  tlie  earthquake  there  had  been  in  the 
niglit.  It  is  not  mentioned  in  the  notice  of  Bishop 
Wilberforce's  Swiss  tour,  curtailed  by  his  biographer, 
no  doubt  to  give  room  for  what  he  deemed  more 
interesting  matter.  As  soon  as  I  knew  it  had  been 
an  earthquake,  I  felt  very  deeply  impressed  at  the 
thoiiglit  tliat  the  huge  Alps  all  about  us  had  been 
flickered  like  a  candle  and  brandished  as  a  sword. 
I  felt  them  to  be  nothing  in  the  Almighty  hand. 


428 


REMINISCENCES. 


Some  j'ears  after  tbis  I  saw  the  terrible  destruction 
done  by  an  earthquake  in  the  valley  from  Visp  to 
Zermatt.  No  doubt  I  should  have  trembled  and 
cowered  as  other  men  had  I  felt  that  earthquake,  but 
it  could  not  give  me  a  more  awful  lesson  than  I  re- 
ceived at  Griudelwald. 

Vol.  a.  page  230. 

From  the  day  I  went  to  Charterhouse,  in  1820,  I 
heard  and  felt  very  strongly  the  fate  of  the  Carthu- 
sian monks,  massacred  by  Henry  VIII.  for  refusing 
to  abandon  their  spiritual  allegiance  to  Rome.  Many 
years  afterwards,  at  a  Founder's  Day  dinner,  I  heard 
Sir  R.  Peel,  after  giving  a  very  grand  tribute  to  the 
memory  of  Sir  Walter  de  Manny,  whom  all  England 
mourned  at  his  death,  make  some  touching  and 
sjnnpathetic  allusions  to  these  Carthusian  monks, 
whose  blood  he  felt  a  consecration  of  the  ground. 

Vol.  a.  page  290. 

The  visitation  of  cholera  at  Oxford,  in  1832,  was  a 
great  shock  to  local  feeling.  The  University  had  been 
thought  safe  from  pests,  possibly  because  Courts  had 
come  here  to  escape  the  plague  in  London.  Oxford 
was  thought  to  deserve  the  immunity,  and  it  was  as 
much  relied  on  as  the  supposed  exemption  from  earth- 
quakes now  enjoyed  by  Rome  for  a  thousand  years  or 
more.  A  lady,  nervous  about  cholera,  took  refuge  at 
Oxford,  and  inquiring  for  airy  and  cheerful  lodgings, 
was  directed  to  some  new  houses  on  the  Cowley  Road, 
occupied  by  Magdalene  College  servants.  Her  land- 
lord brought  home  a  quantity  of  fruit  and  sweets  as 
his  share  of  a  Magdalene  "  gaudy."  She  partook  of 
them  freely,  had  the  cholera  and  died.   The  porter  at 


ADDENDA. 


429 


Oriel  College,  a  former  servant  of  Copleston's,  was 
proud  of  his  college  and  Univei'sity.  "  To  think  of 
Birmingham,  that  vulgar  place,  having  no  cholera,"  he 
would  exclaim  indignantly,  "while  there  is  so  much 
of  it  at  Oxford !  "  It  seemed  to  shake  his  belief  in 
a  Providence. 

Faith  and  Science. 

I  have  mentioned  several  times  the  frequent  col- 
lisions at  Oxford,  not  between  faith  and  science,  but 
between  the  religious  tone  and  the  prevailing  scien- 
tific tone.  From  my  earliest  recollections  of  Oxford 
no  one  ever  received  the  least  discouragement  in  the 
prosecution  of  scientific  studies.  Discoveries  were 
Avelcomed  freely.  Buckland's  lectures  were  always 
well  attended.  I  went  to  several  with  Robert  Wii- 
berforce.  In  the  lecture-room  Buckland  would  speak 
of  theories  as  pegs  to  hang  facts  upon  ;  and  would 
confess  to  changes  or  modifications  of  his  theories.  I 
believe  I  have  seen  lately  a  very  different  account  of 
the  formation  of  "  coprolites  "  than  that  expressed  in 
the  name,  and  enlarged  upon  in  one  of  his  lectures 
that  I  attended. 

I  cannot  recall  Keble  introducing  science  at  all. 
It  would  be  his  nature  to  let  it  go  its  way  so  as  it  let 
him  take  his  way.  But  the  scientific  men  were  tri- 
umphant, and  would  insist  on  winning  and  claiming 
triumphs.  They  were  not  content  unless  they  tied 
you  to  their  chariot  wheels.  It  would  not  be  at  the 
beginning  of  a  journey  that  Keble  would  deliver  the 
dictum  I  have  quoted,  as  to  the  whole  creation,  just 
as  we  see  it,  being  done  momentarily.  It  must  have 
been  at  the  end  of  a  journey,  when  he  had  been  so 
tossed  and  battered  that  he  could  only  say  something 
to  stop  all  further  discussion.    His  was  the  case  of 


430 


REiimSCEXCES. 


Calrin,  who  burnt  Servetus,  not  for  his  heresy,  but 
because  the  man,  who  had  come  to  Geneva  for  the 
purpose,  worried  him  so  incessantly  that  it  became  a 
question  which  was  to  kill  the  other,  and  Calvin,  hav- 
ing work  to  do,  preferred  to  be  the  survivor. 

Fronde.  I  am  quite  sure,  would  have  accepted  all 
the  legitimate  conclusions  of  science.  What  he  com- 
bated was  gratuitous  theory,  having  no  other  object 
than  to  put  further  from  us  all  ideas  of  creation, 
preservation,  and  moral  government. 

Newman,  as  a  rule,  —  indeed  I  cannot  remember 
an  exception,  —  would  have  nothing  to  say  to  phys- 
ical science.  He  abstained  from  it  as  much  as  he  did 
from  material  undertakings  and  worldly  affairs  gener- 
ally. He  would  be  impatient  of  it,  as  of  something 
in  the  way,  not  worth  precious  time.  He  did  indeed 
resent  very  warmly  the  tone  of  scientific  men,  who 
would  challenge,  insult,  revile,  and  extort  submission, 
or  claim  to  have  struck  you  dumb.  There  were  men 
in  those  days  who  might  be  supposed  to  have  read 
nothing  in  the  Bible  except  the  first  chapter  of  Gen- 
esis and  a  few  of  tlie  most  amazing  miracles. 

Dr.  Prichard"s  works  on  the  origin  and  history  of 
the  human  race  excited  much  interest ;  and  my  Ox- 
ford friends  were  amused,  but  not  at  all  scandalized, 
at  the  theory,  which  I  believe  Dr.  Prichard  subse- 
quently abandoned,  that  Adam  and  Eve  were  black. 

Dr.  Buekland's  life  was  shortened  by  an  act  of 
needless  irreverence,  as  I  must  call  it.  When  the 
British  Association  met  at  Salisbury,  they  gave  a  day 
to  Stonehenge.  Buckland  stood  on  the  altar  stone 
and  delivered  an  address.  For  many  years  the  place 
had  been  possessed  by  a  family  named  Brown,  who 
had  constituted  themselves  the  rightful  cicerones,  and 


ADDENDA. 


431 


■who,  to  strengthen  their  claim  of  possession  and  add 
a  trifle  to  their  fees,  had  invented  and  printed  a  the- 
ory that  Stonehenge  was  an  antediluvian  structure, 
and  that  a  slight  rising  of  the  ground  on  the  west 
side  of  some  of  the  outer  stones  was  the  result  of  the 
Flood  coming  that  way  upon  them.  Buckland  might 
well  have  let  this  alone.  But  the  pamphlet  had  been 
put  into  his  hands  by  some  injudicious  person,  and 
his  eye  had  recognized  in  it  the  imputed  action  of  the 
Flood.  So  he  could  not  resist  the  opportunity  of  a 
few  skits  at  the  Flood,  the  ark,  and  the  family  in  it. 
The  day  was  very  cold,  and  there  was  a  drizzling 
rain,  which  Buckland  and  his  hearers  just  endured 
while  he  was  speaking. 

But  Mrs.  Brown,  a  tough  old  lady,  who  had  long 
spent  her  time  in  all  weathers  at  Stonehenge,  and 
who  might  not  have  ventured  to  maintain  her  theory 
unless  provoked  to  it,  accepted  at  once  the  challenge 
on  the  Biblical  question.  Mounting  another  stone 
she  stormed  at  Buckland  as  an  atheist  and  a  good 
deal  worse,  for  so  long  a  time  tliat  the  whole  company, 
bound  to  the  spot,  Avere  perished  with  wet  and  cold. 
They  must  hear  her  out,  and  they  did.  Buckland 
went  back  to  Salisbury  chilled  ;  was  immediately 
taken  very  ill,  and  fell  shortly  into  a  sad  state  from 
which  he  never  recovered  till  he  died. 

In  my  time  at  Oriel  Edward  Denison  was  a  man 
of  science.  Strickland  was  and  became  an  eminent 
geologist.  He  sacrificed  his  life  to  the  pursuit,  for 
while  he  was  making  a  hurried  inspection  of  some  re- 
markable strata  in  a  railway  cutting  near  Retford,  he 
was  surprised  by  a  passing  train  and  killed.  Austen, 
now  better  known  as  Goodwin-Austen,  was  a  man  of 
Bcience,  and  published  works  on  the  fauna  of  the  deep 


432 


EEMINISCENCES. 


sea  in  our  part  of  the  world.  I  cannot  forget  his 
showing  me  in  his  garden  the  fossil  of  a  huge  nauti- 
lus that,  finding  itself  left  dry  by  the  receding  waters, 
had  devoured  some  dozen  small  slugs  in  the  same  evil 
case,  and  had  probably  been  choked  by  one  too  many 
for  it.  This  might  have  occurred,  he  told  me,  twenty- 
five  thousand  years  since,  but  the  chances  were  that 
it  was  much  longer  ago.  All  the  Wilberforces  had  a 
strong  leaning  to  science. 

At  the  visit  of  the  British  Association  which  I 
have  referred  to,  the  University  showed  its  feeling  in 
the  choice  of  a  preacher.  This  was  Mills,  of  Mag- 
dalene. He  was  a  literary  man,  and  something  of  a 
philosopher,  but  not  a  scientific  man  or  a  theologian. 
The  pursuit  of  all  knowledge  —  that  of  natural  sci- 
ence not  the  least  —  was,  he  said,  the  school  of  the 
Christian  virtues.  Humility  he  put  foremost,  as  the 
first  requisite  of  the  learner.  A  devotee  of  science 
had  to  go  through  a  long  apprenticeship  and  long 
years  of  patient  labor  in  the  observation,  selection, 
and  collection  of  materials.  He  had  to  begin  with 
no  theory  ;  to  be  in  no  haste  to  make  a  theory  ;  to  be 
ready  to  give  up  a  theory  ;  and  ready  also  to  learn 
from  others.  He  would  find  his  materials  inci'easing 
on  his  hands,  and  his  views  taking  a  larger  compass. 
I  forget  whether  the  image  is  to  be  found  in  the  ser- 
mon, but  he  left  on  me  the  impression  of  a  philosopher 
bowed  to  the  ground  witli  a  continual  examination  of 
the  new  wonders  revealed  from  its  surface  and  its 
inner  depths.  Much  was  expected  of  Mills,  but  he 
died  young. 

What  I  have  myself  to  say  about  Materialism  is, 
that  it  cannot  define  itself;  it  cannot  account  for 
itself ;  it  can  tell  of  no  beginning ;  it  cannot  do  with- 


ADDENDA. 


433 


oat  forces  or  laws,  whichever  they  are  to  be  called : 
yet  it  cannot  say  how  these  laws  are  enforced,  or 
how  tliey  were  ordained.  Its  philosophers  only  place 
a  little  further  off  in  time  and  space  the  problems 
that  puzzle  an  ordinary  child.  Grant  the  mighty, 
pregnant,  progenitive  atom,  the  mustard  seed  of  the 
whole  living  world.  How  came  the  atom  here,  and 
whence  came  its  powers  ?  Is  all  things  out  of  nothing 
a  greater  miracle  than  nil  things  out  of  a  mote  in  a 
sunbeam  ;  that  is,  supposing  the  mythical  mote  to 
have  found  a  sun  ready  to  light  and  warm  it? 

What  is  even  more,  because  more  horrible  to  think 
of  —  indeed,  almost  maddening  to  contemplate  —  is 
that  Materialism  not  only  annihilates  itself,  but  is  al- 
ready annihilated.  On  its  own  ground  it  is  nothing, 
and  we  ai'e  nothing.  By  the  only  laws  that  the 
Materialist  recognizes,  the  entire  universe,  as  far  as 
the  telescope  can  reacli  or  guess  it,  will  at  a  sufficient 
distance  become  a  galaxy,  then  a  nebula,  and  then 
pass  altogether  out  of  sight,  disapjjearing  in  a  vast 
Nothing.  Even  a  good  Christian,  who  has  not  yet 
faced  the  dismal  thought,  may  shudder  to  reflect  that 
the  awful  work  of  our  salvation  has  been  ail  done  in 
a  speck  which  cannot  be  called  anything  at  all  in  the 
comparison  with  infinity.  The  mere  philosopher  has 
nothing  to  say  against  the  conclusion  that  all  human 
affairs,  enormous  and  overwhelming  as  they  seem, 
are  but  the  incidents  of  an  atom  in  tlie  infinite  scale; 
briefer  than  the  story  of  a  spark  from  the  forge. 
But  the  whole  moral  and  spiritual  nature  revolts 
from  such  ideas.  A  good  man,  nay  a  sane  man,  will 
rather  believe,  as  Henry  Martyn  sometimes  did,  that 
mathematics  are  a  diabolical  illusion  than  that  they 
are  all  the  revelation  given  to  us.    There  must  be 

VOL.  I.  28 


434 


REMINISCEXCES. 


something  else  than  physical  science,  if  all  it  tells  us 
is  comprised  in  the  sentence  that,  wliether  in  space 
or  in  time,  we  are  nothing.  Religion,  at  all  events, 
makes  something  of  us.  It  makes  us  the  lords  of 
creation  and  the  heirs  of  immortality. 

The  Charge  of  Scepticism. 

A  large  part  of  the  public  appears  to  be  amusing 
itself  with  a  question  which  I  am  utterly  unable  to 
treat  with  the  calmness  and  impartiality  expected 
from  those  who  are  to  take  part  in  it.  That  question 
is,  Does  Newman  really  believe  a  word  that  he  says  ? 
There  is  even  something  like  an  elaborate  design  to 
win  from  Newman,  or  at  least  from  his  friends,  by 
all  the  arts  of  the  most  refined  flattery,  a  complete 
surrender  of  faith  in  return  for  such  gifts  and  such 
attributes  and  honors  as  were  never  before  henped 
upon  any  one  man.  If  it  be  only  admitted  that  tlie 
thing  we  are  all  fighting  about  is  just  nothing  at 
all,  that  theology  is  brain  work,  the  Bible  a  legend, 
and  that  Newman  knows  it,  then  it  shall  be  conceded, 
nay  it  is  ali'eady  conceded  —  for  a  large  part  of  the 
price  is  already  deposited  at  the  feet  of  the  Cardi- 
nal—  that  he  is  the  most  wonderful  man  the  world 
ever  saw.  He  is  the  very  premier  of  the  human 
race,  in  intellectual  subtlety,  in  eloquence,  in  com- 
mand of  language,  in  acuteness  and  tenderness,  in 
the  wide  range  of  his  sympathies,  in  elevation  both 
of  character  and  of  thought,  in  his  contempt  of  vulgar 
prizes  and  gauds,  in  his  acquisition  and  marshalling 
of  facts  and  ideas,  in  all  that  makes  a  man  as  much 
greater  than  kings  and  conquerors  as  they  are  greater 
than  common  men.  The  bidding  is  actually  rising. 
The  Cardinal  is  becoming  daily  a  greater  man  in 


ADDENDA. 


435 


all  that  mortals  can  appreciate ;  he  is  promised  the 
effulgence  of  Apollo,  the  shield  of  Achilles,  and  the 
spear  of  Ithuriel  if  only  he,  or  those  who  can  answer 
for  him,  will  declare  that  at  heart  he  is  nothing  at  all. 

What  these  ingenious  writers  wish  to  believe,  and 
wish  all  the  world  to  believe  also,  is  that  Cardinal 
Newman  ever  has  been,  and  is  now,  the  abject  slave 
of  a  craven  terror  and  the  showy  headpiece  of  a 
creeping  thing.  His  honor  indeed,  or  his  vanity,  is 
to  be  saved  just  so  far  that  he  is  not  to  be  set  down 
as  a  wilful  and  deliberate  impostor.  He  is  simply 
flying  from  the  terrible  conviction  he  cannot  get  rid 
of,  namely :  that  Christianity  is  an  old  wives'  fable. 
This,  they  say,  is  the  spectre  that  has  ever  pursued 
him  from  the  battlefield  of  the  Arian  controversy,  not 
any  special  misgiving  as  to  the  Monophysite  charac- 
ter of  Anglican  theology. 

To  represent  what  passes  conception,  strange  im- 
ages are  employed.  In  the  midst  of  the  very  splendor 
of  Newman's  genius,  one  writer  sees  a  small  dark 
spot  conveying  to  tlie  writer  the  comfortable  assur- 
ance that  Newman's  faith  is  the  same  as  his  own  — 
none  at  all.  Another  writer  perceives  that  Newman 
is  fully  aware  that  he  has  nothing  to  stand  upon, 
and  that  if  the  natural  order  of  things  be  left  to  its 
proper  course,  he  must  descend  to  the  common  abyss. 
Newman,  however,  he  proceeds  to  explain,  has  laid 
planks  across  this  abyss,  and  standing  upon  them 
invites  us  to  share  his  basis  as  if  it  were  everlasting, 
though  he  knows  it  to  be  only  a  mechanism  of  his 
own.  Anyhow,  whether  by  argument  or  by  illustra- 
tion, it  must  and  shall  be  made  out  that  the  Cardinal 
is,  and  always  has  been,  essentially  a  sceptic ;  indeed 
far  more  of  a  sceptic  than  they  who  confine  their 


436 


EEMmiSCENCES. 


doubts  to  such  matters  as  traditions  and  writinofs. 
He  has  betaken  himself,  they  say,  to  this  fabulous 
stuff  because  he  doubts  about  everything  else.  He 
has  renounced  nature  and  humanity,  and  taken  refuge 
in  a  dream.  Labor  as  he  will,  talk  as  he  will,  he  can 
never  really  persuade  himself  that  the  dream  is  a 
reality.  He  is  now  therefore  nowhere;  not  in  nature, 
not  in  humanity,  not  even  in  a  dream,  for  a  dream  is 
nothing. 

Something  must  be  allowed  for  the  extreme,  in- 
deed the  passionate,  desire  of  all  unbelievers  to  add 
to  their  strength  by  recruiting  their  ranks.  They  are 
alwaj'S  assuring  the  world  that  such  and  such  a  one, 
hitherto  credited  with  a  strong,  healthy  faith,  is  at 
heart  an  unbeliever,  putting  some  disguise  on  his  real 
convictions.  He  must  be  an  unbeliever;  it  follows 
on  his  own  premises  ;  it  is  impossible  such  a  man 
can  really  believe  what  his  position  or  his  circum- 
stances compel  him  to  pretend.  Scanning  his  compo- 
sition, and  seeing  deeper  into  his  nature  than  he  can 
see  himself,  they  discover  the  true  secret,  the  very 
backbone  of  his  system.  It  is  a  doubt,  they  inform 
the  world;  or  a  basis  which  the  man  himself  has 
manufactured,  and  knows  to  be  good  for  nothing  but 
to  serve  the  purpose  of  the  hour. 

I  cannot  but  give  my  impressions  for  what  they 
are  worth.  Young  people  are  said  to  be  physiogno- 
mists and  judges  of  character.  They  know  a  true 
man.  During  the  whole  period  of  my  personal  ac- 
quaintance and  communication  with  Newman,  I 
never  had  any  other  thought  than  that  he  was  more 
thoroughly  in  earnest,  and  more  entirely  convinced  of 
the  truth  of  what  he  was  saying,  than  any  other 
man  I  had  come  across  yet.    This  conviction,  I  have 


ADDENDA. 


487 


to  say,  was  to  a  certain  extent  unconscious  on  my 
part,  for  I  cannot  remember  ever  to  have  entertained 
the  question  vrhether  Newman  did  really  believe 
everything  he  professed  to  believe.  There  never  oc- 
curred anything  to  suggest  the  contrary.  I  have 
mentioned  that  he  had  read  Tom  Paine  and  other 
infidel  writers  ;  that  he  kept  them  under  lock  and 
key,  and  lent  tliem  out  cautiously  ;  but  it  never  once 
occurred  to  me  that  they  might  have  left  a  sting  be- 
liind.  The  question  of  miracles  Newman  had  dis- 
cussed at  great  length  in  his  paper  on  ApoUonius 
Tyanajus.  So  he  had  treated  Christianity  as  a  ques- 
tion of  evidence  as  well  as  of  probability. 

I  now  see,  what  perhaps  I  might  not  have  seen  so 
clearly  at  that  time,  tliat  the  dread  of  unbelief  may 
have  given  greater  activity  to  belief.  It  might  be 
that  having  once  caught  sight  of  that  spectre,  and 
found  it  for  a  moment  gaining  upon  him,  he  had  re- 
solved never  once  to  abate  the  speed  of  his  onward 
progress,  never  even  to  look  behind,  never  even  to 
indulge  in  any  earthly  abstraction  that  would  give  the 
foe  the  least  advantage. 

It  may  be  said  that  a  man  who  has  to  fly  from  an 
object  is  still  its  victim,  and  that  it  is  really  his 
master,  and  the  rule  of  his  life.  There  are,  indeed, 
those  who  think  that  faith  is  a  thing  for  a  man  to 
rest  upon  and  be  thankful,  and  that  this  in  fact  con- 
stitutes its  great  value.  But  a  very  little  thought  on 
the  common  condition  of  human  life  will  show  that 
faith  is  not  a  fixed  state  but  an  active  course.  We 
are  always  running  away  from  something,  or  pro- 
tecting ourselves  from  something.  We  are  always  in 
the  case  that  if  we  sit  still  somebody  or  something 
will  be  down  uoon  us.  and  if  we  are  not  on  our  guard 


438 


EEMLNISCENCES. 


somebody  or  something  ■will  overpower  us.  Dread  of 
hunger  compels  some,  dread  of  shame  others,  dread 
of  contempt  others  ;  dread  of  nothingness  or  of  them- 
selves consti-ains  a  large  part  of  mankind. 

There  can  be  few  Christians  who  have  not  at 
some  time  had  a  fearful  reminder  of  the  sure  penalty 
of  idleness.  Every  schoolboy  has  had  to  write  an 
essay  on  JSon  progredi  est  regredi^  or  Si  hrachia  forte 
remittis,  etc.  It  may  be  said  that  St.  Paul  himself, 
notwithstanding  his  express  revelations  from  Heaven, 
yet  had  to  stretch  his  hands  to  what  was  before  in 
order  to  escape  from  what  w;is  behind. 

Newman  filled  up  his  whole  time,  taxed  his  whole 
strength,  and  occupied  his  whole  future.  In  so  doing 
he  reduced  retrospection  to  ver\-  narrow  compass,  to 
a  few  faces,  to  flowers  on  a  bank  or  a  wall,  to  a  fra- 
grance or  a  sound.  Perfumes  he  said  brought  back 
the  past,  and  so  did  distant  church  bells,  but  with  the 
scent  and  the  sound  the  past  departed  from  him. 
Employed  all  day,  and  with  much  interruption,  he 
would  find  his  eyes  heavy  when  he  wanted  to  glean  a 
little  night  work  after  an  interrupted  day's  hai^vest. 
He  applied  to  the  doctors.  How  was  he  to  keep  him- 
self awake  harmlessly  ?  I  think,  on  medical  advice, 
he  tried  a  preparation  of  camphor  for  this  purpose. 

Newman  never  took  solitary  walks  if  he  could 
help  it ;  for  he  would  work  and  be  doing  good  while 
at  his  exercise.  For  the  same  reason  he  would  never 
take  a  meal  alone  if  he  could  help  it.  Studious  men 
know  there  are  two  sides  to  this  question.  Russell, 
my  Charterhouse  master,  used  to  tell  his  boys  as  they 
went  off  to  Oxford,  Go  to  as  many  wine  parties  as 
you  please,  but  avoid  breakfast  parties.*'  He  found 
they  unsettled  a  man  for  the  day.    But  even  at  that 


ADDENDA. 


439 


risk  Newman  would  not  be  alone  and  left  to  liis  own 
thoughts  when  he  was  neither  studying,  nor  writing, 
nor  praj'ing.  So,  putting  things  together,  we  might 
s-dj  that  he  was  always  flying  from  a  void,  as  well  as 
from  the  temptation  to  rest. 

This  continual  pressing  forward  and  this  eagerness 
for  activity  told  on  the  direction  of  his  studies  and 
his  "works.  He  strode  or  bounded  over  thousands  of 
smaller  matters  that  occupy  the  scholar  of  the  present 
day.  It  is  with  difficulty  that  I  recall  a  single  criti- 
cal question  as  to  the  text,  the  translation,  the  chro- 
nology, the  authorship,  the  canon,  or  the  harmonizing 
of  the  Scriptures.  I  do  not  think  that  during  tlie 
time  I  saw  much  of  him  he  would  ever  entertain  such 
questions  as  the  authox-sliip  of  the  historical  books, 
the  dates  of  the  several  Psalms,  or  whether  there 
were  two  Isaiahs,  or  whether  the  Book  of  Daniel  was 
written  after  the  events  prophesied,  or  who  wrote  the 
Epistle  to  the  Hebrews.  He  would  not  afford  the 
time  for  inquiries  leading,  if  not  to  a  disappointment, 
at  least  to  a  barren  fact  of  no  great  weight  in  the 
grand  scale.  It  may  be  said  that  he  refused  to  in- 
quii-e  where  the  loss  of  time  would  be  great,  the  bene- 
fit doubtful,  and  the  call  not  peremptory.  But  this  is 
another  thing  from  refusing  to  inquire  from  the  dread 
of  a  negative  result. 

Newman's  character  and  circumstances  alike  pre- 
vented him  from  pursuing  the  special  activity  of  such 
men  as  John  Wesley.  For  as  long  as  I  can  re- 
member him  he  would  have  shuddered  at  the  very 
thouglit  of  founding  a  sect  or  creating  a  schism.  He 
desired  to  modify  the  Church  of  England  as  others 
have  modified  it ;  the  Reformers,  for  example,  Laud, 
for  example,  and  others  nearer  our  time.    It  would 


440 


REMINISCENCES. 


not  have  suited  his  nature  or  his  habits  to  go  about 
from  town  to  town,  telling  the  people  everywhere 
they  were  in  bad  hands  and  must  take  cai-e  of  them- 
selves, forming  them  into  communities  and  putting 
ministers  over  them.  From  first  to  last  he  had  the 
deepest  reverence  for  Bishops  as  such,  and  the  great- 
est dread  of  anything  that  might  interfere  with  pleas- 
ant relations  to  them.  Having  been  on  very  intimate 
terms  with  Lloyd  while  Professor  of  Theology,  and 
then  on  good  terms  with  Burton,  Newman  looked 
with  dismay  to  the  possibility  of  antagonism  with 
their  successors.  When  the  Chair  became  vacant  he 
■wrote  at  the  foot  of  a  note  he  had  occasion  to  send 
me,  "  Pray  for  the  peace  of  Jerusalem,  and  tell  Chris- 
tie to  do  so."  I  doubt  if  I  was  long  on  my  knees  in 
that  matter,  but  I  am  sorry  to  say  I  have  no  doubt 
that  for  one  reason  or  another  I  never  communicated 
the  message  to  Christie.  The  truth  is  that  Kewman 
wished  to  avoid  collision  and  controversy  as  much  as 
possible. 

We  may  then  allowably  ascribe  this  not  only  to 
the  natural  gentleness  which  shrank  from  giving 
pain,  but  quite  as  much  to  a  dread  of  the  trials  which 
faith  itself  might  have  to  encounter  in  the  storms  of 
life.  In  those  storms  it  is  inevitable  that  the  issue  is 
frequently  changed  and  the  greater  question  subor- 
dinated to  the  lesser  question,  perhaps  a  personal 
quarrel.  When  that  is  the  case  it  is  no  longer  the 
faith  that  is  contended  for,  but  some  petty  triumph  ; 
and  faith  itself  is  jeoparded  when  something  else 
rules  the  hour. 

Some  of  these  writers  discover  a  practical  confes- 
sion of  real  unbelief  in  what  they  are  pleased  to  de- 
scribe as  the  fictitious,  that  is  fabricated,  character  of 


ADDENDA. 


441 


the  Cardinal's  arguments  and  style.  I  must  speak 
with  due  submission  to  those  better  read  in  his  later 
works,  but  I  suspect  these  writers  are  forgetting  tliat 
faith  is  an  imaginative  and  creative  power.  As  it 
believes  what  it  does  not  see  or  hear,  and  cannot  in- 
deed truly  conceive,  so  it  has  no  choice  but  to  fill  the 
void  with  what  may  be  called  its  own  forms  and  out- 
lines. Faith  has  no  choice  but  to  accept  the  best  ma- 
terials it  finds,  put  them  together  as  they  will  best 
agree,  and  make  the  most  of  them.  It  will  always 
be  building  castles  and  cities,  and  filling  the  heavens 
with  the  most  glorious  conceivable  counterparts  of  all 
that  earth  can  show.  Faith  will  ever  be  supplying 
the  virtues,  the  graces,  tlie  order,  and  the  happiness 
which  reason  tells  us  there  ought  to  be  below,  but 
which  observation  tells  us  are  sadly  wanting.  P'aith, 
believing  in  the  Omnipotent,  the  All-wise,  and  the 
All-good,  will  always  be  asking  why  the  great  plan 
for  the  intelligent  settlement  of  this  world  has  so 
conspicuously  failed ;  and  how  the  failure  is  to  be  re- 
paired. If  it  tries  to  answer  the  question  it  must  con- 
sult what  oracles  it  can,  and  interpret  as  best  it  may. 
All  this  is  constructive  work,  and  sometimes  very 
hazardous  scalfolding  indeed  —  mere  planks  over  the 
abysmal  darkness.  Faith  knows  it  has  to  stand  a  few 
criticisms.  It  replies  that  it  does  what  it  can  ;  but 
that  anything  is  better  than  to  be  a  mass  of  organized 
matter,  with  no  more  life  or  soul  than  depends  on 
the  transitory  relations  of  certain  molecules  to  one 
another;  or  than  may  possibly  depend  on  causes  un- 
known altogether,  and  not  to  be  even  inquired  after. 

To  the  Cardinal's  own  Oxford  contemporaries  who 
did  not  pass  over  with  him,  the  most  marvellous  event 
of  his  life  must  be  his  miraculous  admission,  not  to 


442 


REMINISCENCES. 


say  absorption,  into  the  Roman  Communion.  A  mir- 
acle, for  such  this  was,  is  not  to  be  argued  about,  or 
even  to  be  spoken  of  except  reverentially.  No  one 
can  answer  for  another's  impressions,  but  I  have  to 
confess  that  the  Cardinal's  account  of  his  on  the  occa- 
sion reminded  me  of  the  Roman  lyrist's  when  the  tute- 
lary goddess  of  his  city  took  possession  of  his  soul :  — 

In  me  tota  mens  Venus 
Cyprum  descruit. 

To  myself  it  must  remain  a  mystery,  if  only  because 
I  have  had  no  such  call.  But  there  is  no  disputing 
that  myriads  of  very  reasonable  men  and  women  in 
all  countries  and  ages  have  had  the  like  call,  as  they 
have  understood  it,  to  some  holier  walk  of  life  and 
some  stricter  profession  than  they  had  known  before. 
The  sensation  indeed  has  been  different.  Some  have 
beeH  drawn  up  towards  heaven,  if  indeed  they  have 
not  found  themselves  in  the  third  heaven  ;  some  have 
felt  heaven  descending  into  them ;  some  have  re- 
mained in  long  ecstasy ;  some  in  sad  abasement ; 
some  in  sweet  companionship  with  spiritual  beings. 
We  have  no  right  to  question  the  fact  of  such  sensa- 
tions. As  little  right  have  we  to  say  that  they  are 
the  creation  of  a  disordered  mind.  We  cannot  deny 
that  where  they  are  God  is  also.  But  the  fact,  that 
is  the  mass  of  like  facts,  is  large  ajid  heterogeneous. 
All  communions,  unless  indeed  that  of  the  Anglican 
Church  is  the  one  happy  exception,  have  contributed 
largely  to  the  chapter  of  miraculous  conversions.  In 
the  last  century  Bishop  Lavington  thought  "  to  kill 
two  birds  with  one  stone,"  as  they  say,  by  "  The  En- 
thusiasm of  the  Methodists  and  Papists  compared." 
It  was  a  thoroughly  English  work,  designed  to  make 
English  Churchmen  quite  satisfied  with  their  own 


ADDENDA. 


443 


even  temperament  and  well-regulated  position.  He 
did  not,  however,  win  the  thanks,  or  even  the  re- 
spect, of  either  Wesleyans,  or  Papists,  or  English 
Churchmen,  for  while  the  two  former  have  accepted 
the  charge  of  enthusiasm,  the  last  have  never  quite 
sanctioned  the  repudiation  of  it.  They  are  too  well 
aware  that  Establishments  are  not  fanatically  dis- 
posed, and  they  don't  much  care  to  be  told  it. 

For  my  own  part,  while  I  have  to  deplore  the  loss 
of  some  thousands  of  good  and  learned  people  from 
the  Church  of  England,  and  the  estrangement  of  per- 
sonal friends,  I  cannot  but  recognize  the  hand  of 
Providence  in  the  event.  The  Roman  Catholic  popu- 
lation of  England  has  immensely  increased  during 
this  century,  chiefly  by  the  influx  of  Irishmen  for 
whom  there  was  no  religious  provision,  and  but  few 
people  of  a  better  class  disposed  to  help  them.  Im- 
portant as  the  fact  was,  and  strongly  as  it  might  ap- 
peal to  the  religious  feelings  of  the  country,  it  had  no 
place  whatever  in  the  Oxford  movement,  and  was 
then  regarded  at  Oxford  as  a  matter  with  which  the 
Church  of  England  had  no  concern.  To  supply  the 
spiritual  needs  of  the  wretched  Irish  colonies  estab- 
lished in  the  worst  quarters  of  our  cities  and  towns, 
was  about  the  last  thing  thought  of.  Providence  has 
brought  these  things  together,  and  has  made  Oxford 
contribute  abundantly  to  the  spiritual  needs  of  the 
poorest  Roman  Catholics,  on  the  very  eve  of  losing 
its  own  distinctively  religious  character. 

As  to  the  future,  who  will  venture  to  forecast  that, 
when  every  year  of  this  century  has  only  supplied  a 
fresh  proof  of  human  shortsightedness  ?  It  is  to  be 
hoped  and  prayed  for  that  the  loudest  talkers  will  not 
be  taken  at  their  own  word.    They  that  talk  of  driv- 


444 


REMINISCENCES. 


ing  troublesome  Church  people  into  the  more  con- 
genial region  of  the  Roman  pale  can  hardly  have 
realized  the  too  possible,  if  not  too  probable,  fulfil- 
ment of  their  wishes.  What  indeed  would  it  be  for 
any  considerable  proportion  of  the  wealth,  the  edu- 
cation, and  the  zeal  of  this  country  to  fall  into  the 
ranks  of  Rome  ?  That  they  are  even  inclined  that 
way,  as  some  think,  is  believed  to  be  a  mischief  and 
a  scandal.  How  then  if  they  should  do  that,  the  very 
threat  of  which  is  injurious  ?  But,  it  is  said,  they 
would  at  least  be  open  foes,  and  we  should  all  know 
what  they  are  at.  England  boasts  that  she  can  meet 
her  enemies  in  the  field.  Rash  indeed  is  it  to  court 
collision  with  unknown  numbers,  unknown  combina- 
tions, and  indeed  unknown  cii'cumstances.  We  are 
not  so  successful  just  now  in  getting  over  our  little 
difficulties  as  to  justify  such  confidence  in  our  future 
treatment  of  any  that  may  occur.  Everything  warns 
us  and  calls  us  to  moderation,  and  to  mutual  tol- 
eration. 

I  have  referred  to  two  events  that  never  were 
thought  of  in  any  mutual  bearing  till  Providence  had 
brought  them  to  bear  one  upon  another,  —  the  large 
outpouring  of  wealth,  culture,  and  faith,  out  of  the 
English  into  the  Roman  Communion,  and  the  vast 
increase  of  the  poor  Roman  Catholic  population  in 
England.  I  will  venture  to  point  out  two  other  events 
that  may  well  be  considered  side  by  side  for  such 
light  as  they  may  throw  the  one  upon  the  other.  These 
two  events  are  the  legislative  exclusion  of  religious 
doctrine,  and  of  the  open  Bible,  from  the  course  of 
education  given  in  our  public  elementary  schools ;  and, 
on  the  other  hand,  the  practical  independence  for  all 
purposes  whatever  now  secured  by  the  Irish  peasan- 


ADDENDA. 


445 


try.  Our  poor  English  serfs  have  submitted  without 
a  struggle,  and  not  a  few  have  lost  their  Christian 
birthriglit.  The  Irish  peasantry,  in  their  own  fashion, 
have  fought  the  battle  of  both  populations,  and  so 
far  have  won  tlie  day. 

The  new  idea  of  Cardinal  Newman  as  a  mere  dia- 
lectician and  orator  is  so  utterly  repugnant  to  all  my 
thoughts  and  feelings  about  him  that  I  am  tempted 
to  add  a  letter  which  I  have  early  referred  to.  When, 
as  I  have  mentioned  in  the  introductory  chapter,  I 
returned  all  Newman's  letters,  I  lamented  that  I  had 
not  seen  this  for  many  years,  and  concluded  I  must 
have  lost  it.  I  was  deceived  by  the  most  important 
matter  of  the  letter  not  appearing  on  the  first  page. 
Newman  had  a  better  recollection  of  its  contents,  and, 
finding  it  among  the  rest,  returned  it.  The  letter 
was  written  just  fifty  years  ago,  while  Hampden  was 
delivering  his  Bampton  Lectures,  and  Newman  him- 
self was  deep  in  his  "  Arians." 

Ohiel  College,  Mai/  13,  1832. 

My  Dear  Mozley,  — J.  Marriott  has  taken  Buck- 
land,  in  this  neighborhood,  on  his  going  into  orders 
in  the  autumn,  but,  the  curacy  being  vacant  in  June, 
the  place  will  be  several  months  without  pastor. 
Stevens  has  told  me  this,  and  on  my  hinting  to  him 
the  possibility  of  its  suiting  you  for  this  interval 
wished  me  to  write  to  you  —  so  I  do.  The  place  you 
know  from  our  Wadley  excursions.  You  distinguished 
yourself  by  racing  up  the  lime  groves  with  Wilber- 
force,  and  rested  under  the  fragrant  firs.  The  popu- 
lation about  600  (?).  The  distance  twelve  miles  from 
Oxford.    There  is  a  cottage  which  is  used  as  a  par- 


446 


REMINISCENCES. 


sonage  for  the  curate.  I  hear  you  are  thinking  of 
duty,  else  I  should  not  have  mentioned  it,  consider- 
ing your  late  illness.  It  has  been  very  unfortunate 
that  you  were  obliged  to  give  up  your  engagement 
with  Round,  but  all  is  for  the  best.  I  am  truly  re- 
joiced to  find  your  desii'e  for  parochial  employment 
has  not  diminished,  and  your  opinion  of  your  own 
health  not  such  as  to  deter  you.  For  myself,  since 
I  heard  your  symptoms  I  have  not  been  alarmed,  but 
some  persons  have  been  very  anxious  about  you.  I 
trust  you  are  to  be  preserved  for  many  good  services 
in  the  best  of  causes.  I  am  sure  you  have  that  in  you 
which  will  come  to  good  if  you  cherish  and  improve 
it.  You  may  think  I  am  saying  a  strange  thing,  per- 
haps an  impertinent  and  misplaced,  and  perhaps 
founded  on  a  misconception,  yet  let  me  say  it,  and 
blame  me  if  it  be  harsh,  namely,  that,  had  it  pleased 
God  to  have  visited  you  with  an  illness  as  serious  as 
the  Colchester  people  thought  it,  it  would  almost 
have  seemed  a  rebuke  for  past  waste  of  time.  I  be- 
lieve that  God  often  cuts  off  those  He  loves,  and  who 
really  are  His,  as  a  judgment,  not  interfering  with 
their  ultimate  safety,  but  as  passing  them  by  as  if  un- 
worthy of  being  made  instruments  of  His  purposes. 
It  is  an  idea  which  was  strong  upon  the  mind  of  my 
brother  during  liis  illnesses  of  the  last  year,  while  he 
did  not  doubt  that  his  future  interests  were  essen- 
tially secure.  I  doubt  not  at  all  that  you  have  all 
along  your  illness  had  thoughts  about  it  far  better  than 
I  can  suggest ;  and  I  reflect  with  thankfulness  that  the 
very  cause  of  it  was  an  endeavor  on  your  part  to  be 
actively  employed,  to  the  notion  of  which  you  still 
cling  ;  yet  I  cannot  but  sorrowfully  confess  to  myself 
(how  much  so  ever  I  wish  to  hide  the  fact  from  my 


ADDENDA. 


447 


own  mind)  that  you  have  lost  much  time  in  the  last 
four  or  five  years.  I  say  I  wish  to  hide  it  from  my- 
self, because,  in  simple  truth,  in  it  I  perceive  a  hu- 
miliation to  myself.  I  have  expected  a  good  deal 
from  you,  and  have  said  I  expected  it.  Hitherto  I 
have  been  disappointed,  and  it  is  a  mortification  to 
me.  I  do  expect  it  still,  but  in  the  meanwhile  time 
is  lost  as  well  as  hope  delayed.  Now  you  must  not 
think  it  unkind  in  me  noticing  this  now,  of  all  times 
of  the  year.  I  notice  it,  not  as  if  you  needed  the  re- 
mark most  now,  rather  less,  but  because  you  have 
more  time  to  think  about  it  now.  It  is  one  especial 
use  of  times  of  illness  to  reflect  about  ourselves. 
Should  you,  however,  really  acquit  yourself  in  your 
own  mind,  thinking  that  the  course  you  have  pursued 
of  letting  your  mind  take  its  own  way  was  the  best 
for  youiself,  I  am  quite  satisfied  and  will  believe  you, 
yet  shall  not  blame  myself  for  leading  you  to  the 
question,  since  no  one  can  be  too  suspicious  about 
himself.  Doubtless  you  have  a  charge  on  you  for 
which  you  must  give  account.  You  have  various  gifts 
and  you  have  good  principles  ;  for  the  credit  of 
those  principles,  for  the  sake  of  the  Church,  and  for 
the  sake  of  your  friends,  who  expect  it  of  you,  see 
that  they  bi'ing  forth  fruit.  I  have  often  had  —  nay 
have  continually  —  anxious  thoughts  about  you,  but 
it  is  unpleasant  to  obtrude  them,  and  now  I  have 
hesitated  much  before  I  got  myself  to  say  what  I 
have  said,  lest  I  should  only  be  making  a  fuss  ;  yet 
believe  me  to  speak  with  very  much  affection  towards 
you.  Two  men  who  know  you  best,  Golightly  and 
Christie,  appear  to  me  to  consider  you  not  at  all  im- 
proved in  your  particular  weak  points.  I  differ  from 
them.    Perhaps  I  am  exaggerating  their  opinion,  and 


448 


REMINISCENCES. 


men  speak  generally  and  largely  when  they  would 
readily  on  consideration  make  exceptions,  etc.  But 
if  this  be  in  any  measure  true,  think  what  it  implies? 
What  are  we  placed  here  for,  except  to  overcome  the 
cvTrepto-TUTos  ajxapria,  whatever  it  be  in  our  own  case  ? 

I  have  no  great  news  for  you  from  this  place. 
Poor  Dornford  is  laid  up  with  a  low  fever.  Wood 
has  left  us,  and  in  a  week  or  two  commences  the  law 
in  London.  The  few  days  he  was  in  Oxford  after 
the  decision  of  our  election  were  sad  indeed  :  they 
made  Fronde  and  me  quite  uncomfortable,  not  as  not 
fully  participating  in  the  act  of  the  college  (of  which 
doubtless  Ch.  has  given  you  an  account),  but  from 
the  notion  of  W.'s  going.  Under  any  circumstances 
it  is  a  painful  thing  on  both  sides,  when  a  man  leaves 
residence  and  parts  from  his  friends  ;  but  I  am  not 
to  lose  him,  as  we  are  to  be  very  regular  correspond- 
ents. Wilson  is  in  residence  this  term,  good  fellow  as 
he  is.  What  a  pleasant  thing  it  would  be  to  have 
more  fellowships  than  eighteen,  ^.  e.,  if  we  could 
always  have  such  good  men  to  put  into  them ! 

Ever  yours  very  affectionately, 
J.  H.  New:man. 


THE  END. 


